My sister and I met for drinks recently at a pirate-themed bar, and this is where the hostess put us:
It’s almost like she knew us or something. Weird!
I’m trying to reach a state of Zen-like calm about Election 2016, which, contrary to my earlier predictions, has become even more fraught than 2008. I’ve come up with this Obscenity Prayer to keep my blood pressure within normal parameters and reduce the urge to reach through the screen and throttle random strangers:
FSM, grant me the indifference to ignore brainless, provocative drivel,
The patience to endure well-meaning nonsense politely,
And the motherfucking wisdom to tell one form of bullshit from another.
Here’s where I’m at: I voted for the person I thought would make the best president. I’ll work my ass off to elect the Democratic Party ticket this fall. And that’s all I can control and/or should worry about.
See how easy that is? I predict this state of enlightenment will last at least an hour or so — maybe even half a day if I don’t read comments.
What are you up to this long weekend (in the US)? Hubby and I are taking a little vacation to celebrate our anniversary, so I’ve got that going for me!
Miss Bianca
You are awesome, Betty Cracker. I must internalize this prayer (and recite it to myself, daily, with an inner Samuel L. Jackson voice).
This weekend, I am helping out the local Democrats for the Memorial Day parade tomorrow (somehow I think it will be too cold and rainy for watermelon, but it’s in the paper, by God, so that’s what we’re doing!), and rehearsing King Lear. Maybe some hikes if I’m lucky.
Major Major Major Major
I’m gonna eat pizza and watch Game of Thrones and probably other things too??
My own version that I mutter to myself when I have to encounter people who aren’t up to balloon-juice levels of informedness is simply forgive them father, they know not what they do.
burnspbesq
The rhythm of baseball can be very soothing.
redshirt
@burnspbesq: Amen. I love baseball for this reason.
redshirt
Betty, are you sincerely worried Trump will win?
If so, just consider his misogyny in context to the first woman candidate. This alone guarantees a Clinton victory.
Baud
Happy anniversary, Betty.
redshirt
My own current mystery is what’s going through a Sanders die hard supporter’s mind. I like to try and understand the mysterious and I must admit, I have no idea what they’re thinking. Just speaking practically.
A Ghost To Most
Hoping to take the mountain attack vehicle up some crappy dirt roads, probing for weaknesses in the still formidable snowpack. I’m itching to get to the high places.
Enjoy your getaway.
lamh36
https://twitter.com/joanwalsh/status/736363725347819520?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
redshirt
@efgoldman: Bandwagon fan!
This Sox team is a fun group that’s making me believe. I’m going to wait till the all star break to fully commit to that assessment though.
lamh36
I don’t have a 3 day weekend. But I do have the weekend off.
I a sooo looking forward to the next 2 days off though.
eemom
Jaws was never my scene and I don’t like Star Wars.
/officially driven insane
burnspbesq
DeGrom looked like DeGrom tonight.
schrodinger's cat
@eemom: Me too. Allergies have been terrible and we have highs in the 90s, in May. Tomorrow’s high 93.
Damien
@redshirt: My favorite thing I read recently was a friend’s Facebook status that began “Dear Clinton Supporters Who Are Hurting the Party….”
I do think that this election cycle has revealed a real hunger in people for a champion who will call bullshit what it is, and who sympathizes that many people feel utterly screwed over by the system. The problem is that marrying that kind of firebrand intensity to someone who is aware of the incremental nature of America’s politics pretty much neuters it, and the people who are demanding immediate gratification just don’t have the patience for this reality.
I think that if Bernie presented workable ideas in a realistic context, but in an inspiring way, we could really have something here; instead we got a cranky, bitter, asshole. This is not to bag on his supporters who mostly seem to appreciate someone finally standing up and shouting their frustrations in the faces that seem most like villains, but Bernie himself is revealing himself to be a John Holmes-level prick.
max
I’m trying to reach a state of Zen-like calm about Election 2016
It’s fine. Really.
which, contrary to my earlier predictions, has become even more fraught than 2008.
Not really. Thinking so indicates a lack of Zen-like perspective.
One woman’s brainless, provocative drivel is another woman’s well-meaning nonsense. The correct thing to say is ‘Don’t read the fucking comments’ aka ‘Don’t get out of the boat’. Like this one: you shouldn’t be reading this, silly.
What are you up to this long weekend (in the US)?
Not reading the comments.
max
[‘Nothing important is happening.’]
redshirt
@Damien: Aren’t you describing Barack?
Gin & Tonic
Spending today and the weekend helping my daughter with child care, as she had surgery yesterday. And as the baby is asleep, watching the zebras rob the Raptors.
NotMax
A pirate bar?
Only beer and rum available?
Mary G
Happy Cracker Anniversary! One of my housemates made chicken salad and egg salad and I am also anticipating Game of Thrones on Sunday.
I saw my original hand surgeon this week and I do need surgery, but put off arranging it til Tuesday.
My life is dull as hell, isn’t it? At least my vertigo is also gone.
oldster
Happy anniversary, BC!
That’s one tasty motherfucking prayer you’ve got there!
Baud
@Gin & Tonic: Hope she is doing well.
gogol's wife
@redshirt:
Wow, I would have thought it was the other way around.
That said, I am adopting the obscenity prayer soonest!
I just had dinner with my husband and a dear friend, and they had never heard of rodent copulation, or Godwinning, or anything else. So that made me a little calmer, I guess. We do live in a little bubble here.
FlyingToaster
I’ve survived my month of hell (running the school bookfair, training on the new library automation system, getting the upright coldframe up and loaded, seeing my daughter NAIL her 2nd semester project, getting the [redacted] to the printers, moving my husband out of his office at the now-former hell-employer and seeing daughter finally learn to swim today.
Tomorrow we go get another batch of plants and then Sunday (hopefully) I rent the rototiller* and turn over the garden. If it rains as promised on Monday, I should be able to plant everything but the tomatoes on Tuesday and those the following weekend after WarriorGirl’s composition concert.
* Normally HerrDoktor turns over the garden. But his arm won’t be up to snuff until at least September, and maybe never. So a Mantis from Home Depot it is.
Baud
@gogol’s wife: Did they look at you funny?
PaulWartenberg2016
I am back from a Friday run at Orlando MegaCon and plan on going back for Saturday, this time dressed in Jedi Cosplay.
I need to kick myself, though, for STILL getting stuck in that damn I-4 traffic every time. Between the convention exit 72 down to US 27, it’s a f-cking parking lot for two hours.
ThresherK
We’re going over the Hudson on the new “Walkway over the Hudson”. Well, sorta new (2009) as a trail, dating to the 1880s as a railroad bridge.
rikyrah
geg6,
I have a Roots answer for you in the previous post. Where to read a good review of it.
LAO
Has anyone seen “Welcome to Leith”? I just watched it on Netflix and I’m speechless (and slightly nauseous).
LAO
@ThresherK: I walked it last November, it’s pretty cool.
Jeff Spender
I don’t get why so many Sanders’ supporters I know have such delicate fee-fees. They can’t play hardball for shit and then whine that people are being mean to them.
Okay, so, when I try to explain the reality of politics, i.e. that there’s always someone who wants to tear down what you build up so you have to fight like hell all of the time, not just every four years, they get pissy.
Condescending, they call me.
And I think that if that’s the worst thing they can think to call me their revolution won’t last for shit.
rikyrah
This weekend is about good food and rest. I have no other plans.
Mingobat f/k/a Karen in GA
Happy anniversary!
Picked up a couple of frames today, and ordered prints of the two photos that will hang in my “graduation” show in a few weeks. It’s actually just the last class in the continuing ed photography program I started last January, but there’ll be food, a certificate thingy and a pat on the back, so why not.
But the best thing will be the days before the last class — I volunteered to do photography at a summer camp for sick kids the first part of that week. Not something I would have been able to do without the skills I gained in the classes. It’s nice to think my photos of happy kids will appear on the camp website every evening, reassuring anxious parents that their children are doing fine and having fun.
I’ll never make a living at it, and probably never even sell a single photo, but it’s nice that I can help make stressed out people happy.
dmsilev
@lamh36: How would that even work? Putting aside the question of WTF Sanders is allegedly thinking, what law or civil contract is violated by the DNC having Barney Frank on some particular committee?
rikyrah
Happy Anniversary BC and Mr.BC ?
Michael Bersin
@Jeff Spender:
This.
Gin & Tonic
@Baud: Thanks. The outcome was better than our worst fears, but not quite as good as we’d hoped.
Adam L Silverman
@Major Major Major Major: @efgoldman: What happened? I missed it!
Mnemosyne
I’m sitting at a bar after having a Strawberry Collins and a glass of rose. I don’t care about any of your election bullshit.
Mnemo +2
Gin & Tonic
What the fuck is the rule now, three and a half steps?
redshirt
@efgoldman: Despite your legacy, still a bandwagon.
gogol's wife
@Baud:
They looked at me as if I had lost my mind.
I did a dramatic reading of Ted Cruz’s rodent-copulation press conference, and the friend said, “That’s really good, you should try to get that on Saturday Night Live.” He had no idea that I was just doing a transcript of an actual event. He thought I had composed it as a satire.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I don’t think that’s a distinction that can be made anymore
Schlemazel Khan
@burnspbesq:
I love baseball in the summer, it has exactly the right rhythm. I have stopped going to MLB games though for many reasons chief of them is that they play ear shattering noise between innings, people stay seated between innings and then get up to get treats as soon as the pitcher is set and nobody seems interested in the game. We go to kid games & some minor league games because they are much more respectful of the game. Also have become big fans of womens fastpitch. The changed the ball a few years back & hitters are scoring runs. The college world series is going on now & there are some great games but I have to listen with the sound off because they have the crowd noise turned up to 11.
Adam L Silverman
@LAO: I’ve seen it. Not on Netflix. Its disturbing. The good news is that these folks are a distinct minority in terms of numbers. The bad news is they are heavily armed and lightly tethered to reality. The worse news is that Trump’s campaign and rhetoric is encouraging them to come out of the shadows and the places they think are safe to inhabit and live in.
trollhattan
CA ballot mailed today, I had the kid fill in the bubble next to Hillary Clinton so she could feel what it’s like voting for the first woman president. In four years she gets a ballot of her own.
dmsilev
@efgoldman:
So, ‘day ending in y’, then?
chopper
@dmsilev:
barney said something about sanders not being super awesome ergo he must pay.
Gravenstone
Continuing to (mostly) enjoy the Legion beta. I’m beginning to wonder if some sick bastard at Blizzard is displaying a warped sense of humor in making sure my NPC healer spends the entire battle nuking the mobs instead healing my tank?
gogol's wife
Not that I would ever watch Happy Valley, but I was offended that the New Yorker had a whole (positive) review of Happy Valley that never mentioned James Norton’s name. Weird.
Adam L Silverman
@efgoldman: Congrats!!!!!! What job?
Eric U.
@burnspbesq: I want to take my brother to a baseball game. He has a AAA team in his town, but whenever I go there, they are playing an away series. Sitting in the stands with good beer on a nice summer evening is really nice, even though the games often suck.
gogol's wife
@Adam L Silverman:
It’s a think tank called “Crimea for the Crimeans.”
J/K
seaboogie
@Mary G: Do you have any news of HBM?
SFAW
@burnspbesq:
Thank FSM for that, although Familia seems to be doing his best to make it interesting.
Gravenstone
@dmsilev: At this point, I’d argue for banning Bernie from the fucking convention. Duplicitous fuck, take your spoilt brat children and stay the fuck out.
KS in MA
@lamh36: Look out, Orly Taitz! Bernie may be gaining on you!
Adam L Silverman
@gogol’s wife: Well that will be easy to remember.
kindness
Sent in my absentee ballot for the June 7 primary this morning. Voted for Hillary. But I will be attending a Bernie Music event at the Great American Music Hall Sunday. Good line up. Hope the BernieBros aren’t too obnoxious or I might have to tell them what I think.
redshirt
@trollhattan: That’s cute. Raising a future Dem, I hope!
NotMax
@Adam L. Silverman
Became available via Netflix streaming on May 18.
redshirt
@Eric U.: Maybe it’s because I’m getting old, or pissed at the NFL, but baseball is so perfect. A summer weekend game on the radio while you’re grilling and hanging outside just seems like heaven.
Going to a game is another experience, though MLB games are too expensive. We have the AA Sea Dogs in Portland ME and it’s a perfect experience. 5 dollar tickets, fun inter-inning activities, nice stadium in a nice location, summer time… ahh. It’s great.
Adam L Silverman
@NotMax: I saw it when it first came out. I think it was on PBS. Its an excellent documentary Makes you appreciate what the folks in Burns and Harney County went through last DEC-JAN when the Bundy Circus came to town.
Major Major Major Major
@Adam L Silverman: Pythonista at Fancy Pants McGee Education Policy Think Tank. It would be a ‘senior’ post at a startup but that just means I’m over 30.
Redshift
My version of the obscenity prayer, which is the only New Years resolution I’ve ever kept long-term, is “don’t get into arguments with idiots.” Idiots, for this purpose, being defined as annoying people who are definitely not going to be swayed by any argument I make.
Because while it’s annoying to know that “someone is wrong on the internet” and not respond, if you don’t respond, you can forget it. If you respond, even once, them you’re engaged, and your brain will be coming up with “what I should have said” for weeks.
Definitely contributes to a Zen-like calm.
Now I’m going outside to see the space station go overhead. (At 10:13 here in the DC area, look a minute or two after that, and you can’t miss it.)
trollhattan
@redshirt:
As long as she doesn’t pull an Alex Keaton on me I think we’re good to go. I haven’t told her to be Republican means she has to start hating on gays, minorities and the environment while stashing ammo.
dmsilev
@dmsilev: OK, so Rachel Maddow posted the letter from the Sanders campaign legal team to the DNC. It’s a JPG, so I can’t easily cut and paste, but the gist of it is that because Barney Frank and Dan Malloy advocated for Hillary and said things about Sanders that Sanders thinks were mean, they should be removed from their convention committee positions.
It’s kind of sad watching an ostensible adult throw a toddler temper-tantrum.
NotMax
@redshirt
Baseball was invented to give people who find watching paint dry too stimulating something to do.
schrodinger's cat
@trollhattan: Did you watch the Americans, yesterday? PT still lives!
Felixmoronia
@Adam L Silverman: I have not seen the movie in question but did recently watch “Look Who’s Back” on netflix, supposedly about Hitler, but I saw Trump. Un-nerving.
Gin & Tonic
@Major Major Major Major: Congratulations.
Major Major Major Major
Ostensible Adult would be a decent band name. Or an album.
Redshift
@srv: Thanks for that excerpt; it’s definitely one of your all-time funniest comments!
Baud
@gogol’s wife: Best not tell them about Balloon Juice.
Adam L Silverman
@Major Major Major Major: Excellent. Congratulations. I hope you have better luck than I did at a research center last year. I was hired to be a senior fellow. Turns out that actually translated to: “world’s most overpaid editorial assistant.” I didn’t stick around long.
Baud
@Redshift: I appreciate srv. Unlike other trolls, he puts effort into knowing his audience.
Miss Bianca
@FlyingToaster: btw, completely o/t but I’m still laughing about “Teufelstoertchen”.
Baud
@dmsilev: JPG? Really? In 2016?
NotMax
@Adam L. Silverman
Watched Ken Burns’ three-part Prohibition series earlier this week. Worthwhile, though obviously padded – would have worked better in two parts.
Adam L Silverman
@Felixmoronia: Its an excellent, thought provoking, and disturbing documentary.
pseudonymous in nc
I will tip the hat to the Sanders supporters who’ve been turning #ChickenTrump into a thing. Well played, those people.
I think that has legs. Though not a head.
trollhattan
@schrodinger’s cat:
Holy moly! Paige sure got an eyeful of mom and her skillset, and was the “dinner for seven” awkward enough for you? I think Henry is the last happy character, which must not stand.
ThresherK
@LAO: We’re betting each other on who will be the most afraid of the height.
Miss Bianca
@LAO: What is it?
ETA: Never mind, I think I’m grokking the sense of it from comments down below…
NotMax
@Felixmoronia
Billing that as a comedy, as Netflix does, is highly misleading.
burnspbesq
Baseball fucks with somebody every night. Tonight it’s the Dodgers’ turn.
trollhattan
@NotMax:
I enjoyed it especially for how a looney idea can take hold and not be denied. Had no idea the Klan was so involved–the D.C. march was…disturbing.
Major Major Major Major
@Adam L Silverman: thanks. Thanks efg!
hovercraft
@lamh36:
From Maddow’s explanation the lawyers aren’t actually suing the DNC, the are threatening to basically throw a giant tantrum and prevent any of the business of the convention occurring. That way Hillary cannot actually be nominated. I see this as a great way to persuade the supers to come to your side. I guess this is cheaper than a law suit.
LAO
@ThresherK: focus on the view. It’s amazing, avoid looking straight down.
NotMax
@gogol’s wife
One of the funniest bits ever seen live was a purposely stuffy, staid and over-dramatized straight reading of the lyrics of The Beatles’ “Hello, Goodbye.”
Adam L Silverman
@Miss Bianca: You can watch it at the PBS link if you don’t have the Netflix:
http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/films/welcome-to-leith/
The link also has a good summary and some other material.
dmsilev
@Baud: I’m sure someone has OCR’d it and posted a PDF by now, but I’m too lazy to go look.
I’ll note that Sanders’ complaints against Frank start with something that Frank said in 1991. Man, those Clinton supporters sure do play the long game.
Adam L Silverman
@NotMax: I’ve got a Secrets of the Dead on how a lawyer seems to have found Cleopatra’s tomb when all the professional archeologists thought she was nuts that I need to finish. No offense to our own Mighty Trowel. And about five Frontlines I’ve got sitting on the DVR that I need to get through. And one documentary on the Japanese internment camps of WW II. Also, the Supergirl season 1 finale – so no spoilers!
Miss Bianca
@Adam L Silverman: Oh, God, it’s *that* place! *Those* guys! Oh, this is going to be scary. Thanks, tho’…I think!
hovercraft
@dmsilev:
Not a law but since they’ve both endorsed her they are not impartial, so they will try to steal the nomination for her. But since upwards of 90% are with her where are the impartials supposed to come from? Or should we now have the DNC committees run by independents ?
redshirt
@Redshift: Heh. I just saw it, and it was literally right over my house. I’ve seen it many times but this was the best by far. Like a moving Venus.
Felixmoronia
@Miss Bianca: That is my reaction to what that doc is about. Did you get to Paonia this week?
chromeagnomen
@efgoldman: saw Ted in ’59 for my first game, though you probably beat that. those teams were terrible.
Felixmoronia
@NotMax: Absolutely!
redshirt
@Adam L Silverman: Have you seen all the Netflix Marvel shows?
burnspbesq
This is the last fucking straw.
http://www.msnbc.com/sites/msnbc/files/sandersletter_160527.jpg
Miss Bianca
@Felixmoronia: Next week. Job interview. Do you know Paonia?
NotMax
@Adam L. Silverman
Can’t find the link right this moment, but wonder if you’ve ever seen some of satellite (or maybe high altitude aircraft – fuzzy memory on that) pictures produced not all that long ago of a project using ground-penetrating radar over swaths of Egypt.
All sorts of intriguing and enticing clues.
Adam L Silverman
@Miss Bianca: Its not scary, but its not a lighthearted, “I learned something new, cool, and interesting” documentary either.
schrodinger's cat
@trollhattan: That was awkward. Stan is kinda pathetic, mooching dinners off of the Jennings. Paige continues whining in the next episode too. I saw the promo for next week. I wish they send her to a boarding in Siberia.
redshirt
@NotMax: Satellite archeology is a new and cool thing. I kinda recall reading recently about some kid discovering a new Maya temple in the jungles of Mexico via Google maps images.
SFAW
@burnspbesq:
Is it correct to surmise that you were that “someone” tonight? If so: it ain’t the Dodgers doing it — it was Terry “Not a Baseball Manager, But I Play One On TV” Collins doing it. He’s not as incompetent as Matt Williams was, but that’s kind of like saying Plan 9 from Outer Space wasn’t as bad a movie as Glen or Glenda.
schrodinger's cat
I am totally bored with Sanders dead ender drama. Please go home, I hear Vermont is pretty, this time of the year.
Adam L Silverman
@redshirt: No. I’m working my way through Daredevil, which I have found so far to be excellent. I will most likely not watch Jessica Jones.
burnspbesq
Some enterprising reporter needs to stick a microphone in Barney Frank’s face right about now.
dmsilev
@burnspbesq: I’m trying as hard as I can to convince myself that this will all blow over after next Tuesday, but I don’t know. Clinton in 2008 had a real incentive to play nice with the Party and mend fences. Sanders’ incentives are less clear and I’m starting to worry that he may try to go all kamikaze on us.
Miss Bianca
@Adam L Silverman: Instead it’s an “I learned something old as the hills, deeply uncool, and only interesting in the way a wreck on the highway can be interesting” kind of documentary? //
Adam L Silverman
@burnspbesq: Notice that they fail to use Congressman Frank’s proper title and/or appellation? He should either be referred to as US Representative Frank or Congressman Frank. Not Mr. Frank. They got Governor Malloy right though.
dmsilev
@burnspbesq: Fortunately, Frank is fond of microphones…
Felixmoronia
@Miss Bianca: I live at the stoplight between Jct, Gunnison & Tohelluride>
Adam L Silverman
@NotMax: Sounds familiar, but if I did I was reading the write up on it/looking at if out of curiosity. I’ll search for it later and see what’s what with it.
dmsilev
@Adam L Silverman: Is that true since he’s retired now? Do you still get to claim the title after leaving the position?
debbie
@gogol’s wife:
I resorted to YouTube to remind myself of that speech and couldn’t stop laughing. You can’t parody that stuff!
burnspbesq
@SFAW:
Collins put Familia in a non-save situation, and the Dodgers got four in the top of the ninth to tie the game, leaving the go-ahead run on third.
Granderson leads off the bottom of the ninth with a walk-off HR.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@trollhattan: @schrodinger’s cat: That fucking show! I wanna go back and rewatch it from the start.
Stan is pathetic, but a powder keg. And if Keri Russell hasn’t been nominated for an emmy, I nominate Bernie Sanders to rout out the corruption and rigging! He can go back to when Lorraine Toussaint didn’t get one for her turn in OITNB
Carl W
@redshirt: Although, sadly, according to the real archaeologists it’s much more likely that what he found was an old field.
gf120581
@dmsilev: Eh, let him. He’s really just making himself irrelevant with his behavior. After Hillary clinches, Obama will come off the sidelines and endorse along with Warren and that will be the end of it. Sanders can just go stew in the corner like the sore loser he is.
Really, I think it just goes back to what Howard Dean said recently; Sanders is a poor loser.
Adam L Silverman
@redshirt: I saw that. I remember back in 91 that they found a missing ancient city/caravansary in the Rub al Khali because of satellite imagery. They could see all the caravan roads, even buried under shifting sands, radiating out from one spot in the middle of nowhere.
Miss Bianca
@Felixmoronia: Great gasbags! There’s a *road* there? *And* there’s a *stoplight*?
Yay – when/if I move back home, maybe we can persuade the Front Rangers to meet up on the Western Slope!
NotMax
@Adam L. Silverman
Just started watching The Assets, about the Aldrich Ames/C.I.A. matter, on Netflix. Thus far, pretty good (although am sure it takes some dramatic liberties with the pure facts).
geg6
@lamh36:
I don’t think this is a fight he wants to pick. Barney Frank will eat him for lunch. He can’t win that fight.
redshirt
@Adam L Silverman: Daredevil is excellent. If for no other reason fight co-ordination.
Why won’t you watch JJ? Did you know Luke Cage is in it?
LAO
@burnspbesq: it was disconcerting, to say the least.
magurakurin
@NotMax: no, that was soccer.
trollhattan
@schrodinger’s cat:
Speaking of Siberia, found out this week an Austrian friend’s father spent a decade in a gulag there after being arrested for spying during the occupation. Mind=blown.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Did he say it out right? I’m kind of lukewarm on Dean (# confess your unpopular opinion), but he does seem to have Bernie!’s number
redshirt
@Carl W: Yeah, I read about that follow up too. But satellite archeology is a real thing. It would be great if sources could put up a satellite dedicated towards it.
Felixmoronia
@Miss Bianca: persuade the Front Rangers to meet up on the Western Slope! Yeah right
Adam L Silverman
@Miss Bianca: Something like that. Or you could watch this about one of my professional forebears and get a better idea of what my job is sort of like:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Dbg0KLpJ6c
Though in my defense I’ve never actually parachuted out of a plane or planned an actual insurgency against the enemy in pursuit of the Coalition’s theater strategy and campaign. Though I did do the latter once in a war game, which really isn’t that exciting as it consisted mostly of paperwork.
Mike in NC
Tonight on Hulu we’ve been alternating between episodes of “Mindy Project” and “11.22.63”.
Miss Bianca
@burnspbesq: Oh, what the ever-loving fuck. I mean, I heard about this but somehow it just seems even more galling and petty in the original legalese. Bernie Sanders is starting to remind me of the guy who gets sand kicked in his face in the old Charles Atlas ads in the back of comic books – “that darn old Barney Frank! He’s so mean! I wish there was *some* way I could teach him a lesson!”
trollhattan
@geg6:
A man of considerable talents, my favorite Barney quip was telling a woman that speaking with her was like debating the dining table.
He’s about the last politician I’d spar with.
Adam L Silverman
@dmsilev: Yes. The protocol manuals indicate that you are referred to by your highest achieved – elected, appointed, and/or earned (educationally, military rank – those this is often considered appointed) rank and title. To be really formal you’d go with US Representative (retired) or (ret) Frank or Congressman (ret) Frank. The only people that would use Mr. or Mrs. or Ms. is the NY Times because they have this absolutely whacked style guide on these things.
burnspbesq
@LAO:
No shit. Still, a lot of positives tonight. Seven good innings from DeGrom, a three-hit, three-RBI night for Lagares, and some slick infield defense.
Miss Bianca
@Adam L Silverman: You’ve done it to me *again*!! LMAO! Even in a *war game* they’ve got you doing paperwork?!
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@trollhattan: I’ve seen him on the O’Donnell show a few times– LO’D has a major bug up his ass about HRC– and I got the sense he’s working very hard to hold himself in check
SFAW
@burnspbesq:
Well, it may have started out as a non-save situation …
When Familia walked in run #2, Collins should have brought in Robles or Bastardo. And he should have had one of them warming up after the three singles. Familia is not Rivera — although when his sinker is working, he’s practically unhittable — but all Collins can understand is that Familia is his “closer.” I guess Collins is smarter than Jimmy Buzzard, but that’s not exactly a high bar.
magurakurin
@Adam L Silverman: Jessica Jones is good, but not nearly as good as Daredevil. I think some of it comes down to personal taste, but also on an objective level Daredevil was just better. Jessica Jones is worth watching though, some interesting parts. And it is better than say Arrow or Flash, in my opinion.
Miss Bianca
@Felixmoronia: well…she said, smiling…maybe we should throw it open. Make it a BJ camp-out for as many as will – wherever you come from. What do you bet that there’d be folks who would come from other parts of the country? Then the Front Rangers would *have* to come! ; )
@trollhattan: That is mind-blowing.
schrodinger's cat
@NotMax: Also, under water archaeology. There must be so many wrecks up and down the coast of India, for example. Indians have traded with the Arabs for thousands of years.
I had an opportunity to see an exhibit from early British excavations in Mesopotamia at UPenn, there were carnelian beads and other jewelry from India found in those digs, some were a couple of thousand years old.
SFAW
@LAO:
“To say the least” is right.
I keep hoping that the Wilpons (or Alderson) trade Collins to the Cubbies for Maddon, but I don’t think Theo would go for that, the bastard.
magurakurin
@dmsilev: He might go kamikaze, but I suppose Bernie should probably keep in mind that that didn’t work out real well for the Japanese in the end. You know, Obama just visited there. There is a fair amount of damage that could be done to Sanders if the entire Democratic Party decides to turn its guns on him. Pretty sure there is something in those tax returns and a few well placed calls to the IRS…
Adam L Silverman
@redshirt: I am aware Luke Cage is in it. Someone else recently asked me why I wouldn’t watch Jessica Jones, so I’m going to copy and paste my response to that person below within the quote field. Just as an aside before I do, you once asked me to do a comic book related post. I’m actually working on two. One of which will be Batman: The Killing Joke as the animated movie for that is coming out late next month. Some of the same qualms I have about Jessica Jones go for the Killing Joke’s treatment of Batgirl/Barbara Gordon, which is why I’ve been dragging my feet.
Okay, here’s your answer:
Adam L Silverman
@NotMax: That sounds interesting!
schrodinger's cat
@trollhattan: When was this? During WWII or the Cold War era?
NotMax
@Adam L. Silverman
Just occurred to me that you might like it –
Wild Boys, an Australian series about bush rangers (highwaymen) in 1850s Australia. Strong writing and acting, meticulous attention to period detail and gorgeously filmed. First episode is primarily set-up (duh!) – the characters are nowhere near the cardboard cut-outs they might first seem to be. A rollicking good time.
The production company has generously made all 13 episodes available on YouTube.
Adam L Silverman
@Miss Bianca: I was there to be me professionally. So I wrote the info paper laying out the strategy, why it was necessary, pros and cons, then did the slides laying out the planning stages, and submitted it into the decision making cycle. Given how the scenario was written it made sense to do, I just got my mitts on that loose thread and started pulling before anyone else. Largely because it was host country population centric and that’s my thing.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
divF
@efgoldman:
Hmph. I grew up watching the Senators (expansion version) in the 60’s. You didn’t root for them, you endured them. Although it is true that we finished 1/2 game ahead of Boston in 1966.
“First in war, first in peace, last in the American League.”
schrodinger's cat
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: He must know him well, being from Vermont.
Adam L Silverman
@schrodinger’s cat: The Israelis just found a wreck off the coast.
http://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-News/2016/05/17/Israeli-archaeologists-find-shipwreck-full-of-1600-year-old-treasures/4111463512568/
Felixmoronia
@Miss Bianca: It would have to be at Ridgeway State Park as there is no pot selling in Montrose county!
P.S. Is paonia home?
Adam L Silverman
@NotMax: I’ve heard of it, but never seen it. Thanks, I’ll check it out.
SFAW
@efgoldman:
I thought I saw something about him being a Pythonista as some Education Policy Think Tank. Although I’m baffled as to why a place like that would have a big need for someone who could recite the Spanish Inquisition sketch, etc., whilst drinking Watney’s bleedin’ Red Barrel.
Mike in NC
@efgoldman: Knew some people in Providence that loved the PawSox. My roommate at Navy OCS was from Seattle and both he and his wife were huge baseball fanatics. He insisted we go to Boston after graduation to see a Red Sox game, but I was so bored l could barely stay awake.
schrodinger's cat
@NotMax: Ken Burns does not believe in brevity.
Major Major Major Major
@SFAW: you’d be surprised.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I love scales-fallen-from-his-eyes Cole
schrodinger's cat
@Adam L Silverman: Cool!
redshirt
@efgoldman: Where did you live? I lived in an apartment on Boylston St right in front of the stadium – in fact I could see the center field bleachers through my living room window. And the big scoreboard.
I also lived on Queensland in the Fens and Westland Ave down by the Symphony. Close, but not open window close.
Felixmoronia
@Miss Bianca: IF you are driving thru Montrose next week and need a coffee send me an email at coffeedog at bresnan dot net. I’ve never met a BJer in real life. I’m told the exist.
Miss Bianca
@Adam L Silverman: I am sure that is the case, it’s just the laywoman’s amusement coming out in me – something about the term “war games”, juxtaposed with the reality that war is as much about paperwork as it is about actual combat.
Nice piece of criticism on Jessica Jones and Killing Joke, btw – I was one the fence about whether or not to queue JJ up. It was getting a lot of buzz on the Tor Books website, and of course, I adore Luke Cage – he was my favorite superhero as a kid. I think I may be inclining toward “not”, at this point.
I haven’t read The Killing Joke in ages, and frankly, I thought most of Alan Moore’s work paled in comparison to the amazing job he did on “Swamp Thing” – simply the most sublime retcon ever, I thought. I read that one first and went on to Watchmen, and some of his other stuff and I dunno…it’s astonishing to me that something about the *medium* of comics tend to show up what’s going on in a writer’s mind – both Alan Moore and Frank Miller started to disturb me a lot – and it happened when they were both writing about Batman, I realize suddenly. I stopped reading both writers after “Killing Joke” and “Dark Knight” came out.
Major Major Major Major
This Barney Frank thing is RIDICULOUS.
Miss Bianca
@Felixmoronia: Yes. I haven’t lived there for a while, but I still own a house there, it is home, and I am praying – you cannot know how earnestly – that this job comes thru’ and I can return.
divF
@divF: Looking more carefully at the final AL standings in 1966:
7. A’s (KC) 74-86
8. Senators 71-88
9. Red Sox 72-90
10. Yankees 70-89
Everyone else played 162 games. I think we can see the rainouts that did not get made up. ETA: Correction; the Orioles were 97-63.
Amir Khalid
@Major Major Major Major:
I don’t believe I’ve congratulated you yet on the new job. So, congratulations. Do you really get to quote Monty Python all day? “Spam, spam, spam, spam, spam and spam.” Cool!
EBT
I prefer Calvin’s version. Grant me the strength to change what I can, the serenity to accept what I cannot and the complete and total inability to tell the difference.
dmsilev
@Major Major Major Major: To more or less repeat myself, it’s kind of sad watching an adult and his organization collectively act like a three year old whose blankey has just been taken away.
hovercraft
@efgoldman:
We liberals have been mocking the epistemic closure on the right for so long that it hurts to see such a big chunk of it on our side. Somehow to them this makes sense.
schrodinger's cat
@Major Major Major Major: Epic whining is epic, its like a toddler tantrum. BTW, congrats on the new job!
Major Major Major Major
@Amir Khalid: Thanks.
No.
Adam L Silverman
@Miss Bianca: I once remarked at the weekly brigade staff meeting/briefing for the commander, that if we really wanted to make the anti-Iraqi government forces (AQI, Jaish al Mehdi, other insurgents) to capitulate that we should just make them sit through a planning session. After being crammed into a conference room for ten hours, drinking TOC (tactical operations center) coffee and baked goods that started going stale during the first 1/2 hour of the meeting, with the three A/C units barely keeping up given how many people we’d crammed into the room, and being subjected to death by power point they would immediately sue for peace rather than face the threat of coming back and doing it again the next day! Many people laughed loudly, which woke up the chaplain who had nodded off from the heat in the back corner of the room.
As for Jessica Jones: Everyone I know who has seen it has said its excellent. I just have issue with what was done with the character. So if you want to watch it, don’t let my view influence you. And as I indicated, I’ll have more on the Killing Joke in a few weeks.
As for Moore and Miller – I’m not a huge fan of either. I thought the latter’s original four episode run on Wolverine was very good. And while the original Dark Knight Returns was good, it got funky as the story went on – like Miller was losing it. I had the same feelings about Moore’s V for Vendetta and Watchmen. In fact I found Watchmen unreadable and never finished it. I think I actually threw it out. That’s how bad I thought it was.
pseudonymous in nc
@Adam L Silverman:
That’s just being pissy towards former congressman Frank, and I don’t think the convention there is to retain the appellation. More broadly, for a supposed republic, the idea that people get to keep ex officio [civilian] titles always amuses me.
There is only one constitutionally-acceptable title of nobility in America and it is ‘Coach’.
divF
@Major Major Major Major: Unlike everyone else so far, I will make a different joke about your new job. I am not a fan of Python, since I believe, as it said in the epigraph of John Foderaro’s Ph.D thesis, “Strong Typing is Freedom”.
Foderaro’s thesis was on a programming language for computer algebra systems, called Newspeak. He finished in 1985 (a year late, apparently).
All kidding aside, congratulations.
Really?
I must say, apropos of nothing, that it would be hilarious to hear Hillary make some joke about NBA players and “when are they bringing back the short-shorts?”
It’s just that I read some blurb about that today and then Angie Mentink says the same thing about her colleague and his college days during the pre-game.
I remember the days when Roger Murdock had to drag Walton and Lanier up and down the court for 48 minutes.
Adam L Silverman
@pseudonymous in nc: I’m not saying its a great thing, but considering what I do professionally, I’m kind of steeped in it. Most of the military retirees I know, below the flag ranks, go by Mr., Ms., or Mrs. The retirees that demand you call them Colonel so and so are the ones to be worried about.
SFAW
@Major Major Major Major:
Would it have killed you just to have gone with it, at least for a little bit?
Adam L Silverman
@Miss Bianca: You’ve got mail.
Emma
I have gone back to one of my very first passions: the archaeology of Stonehenge. Except that it isn’t just Stonehenge anymore. It’s the Stonehenge Hidden Landscapes, and wonderful things are coming to light. Especially Durrington Walls, the largest henge in Britain, built at the same time as Stonehenge, where thousands of people met to feast and then take the ashes of their dead to the river and so to Stonehenge. And I just found out you can actually walk the whole landscape.
Guess who’s going back to hiking?
And honestly, Bernie? This too shall pass.
SiubhanDuinne
@Adam L Silverman:
Have you ever read “The Singing Sands” by Josephine Tey? If not, I recommend you do so at the earliest opportunity.
divF
@Adam L Silverman:
I take it that is not a dark roast.
When I first started out, I collaborated with some folks at a Navy Lab in Maryland. The GSA coffee (which was made in a giant percolator) was vile beyond all description.
Major Major Major Major
@divF: Eh, I like Guido (PBUH)’s “we’re all adults here” mindset.
BlueDWarrior
As a Cubs fan, I just want to enjoy Maddon’s wild ride for as long as the Lord above and the baseball gods will let us have him. Him, Theo, and the Ricketts seem perfectly capable of building the Cubs into a good overall franchise. Whereas the Tribune Company just seemed to only care every so many years to build a halfway decent team, and not an overall good, stable franchise.
And yes, I am perfectly aware of the crazy right-wing politics the Ricketts family; I think I’m mature enough to keep the sports and the politics separate. I just hope the family is as well.
Adam L Silverman
@SiubhanDuinne: Nope, but it looks interesting. I’ll put it on the list.
Major Major Major Major
@SFAW: To be honest I couldn’t think of anything funny, but by all means go nuts.
Adam L Silverman
@divF: Yeah, its not the best brew in the world.
Miss Bianca
@Adam L Silverman: That little vignette is a short story all by itself – the detail about waking up the parson makes it worthy of Patrick O’Brian!
I really wanted to like “Watchmen”. I think AM has a real flair for dialogue. But at this point I can’t remember whether I finished it or not – I think I didn’t, then I saw the movie, which I found well-done but rather sickening, and that made me think I must *not* have finished “Watchmen” after all.
I don’t know the character of Jessica Jones or what world she fits into so I don’t have a dog in that fight – but I am sick unto death of rape, or the threat of rape, as a trope for female characters. Bad enough to have to live with it, but to see it constantly thrown up into works of art or entertainment – to see female characters threatened with it almost routinely – is just…I dunno. I find it a little hard to talk about coherently, my objections to it.
ETA: Rape and murder, I should say.
A Ghost To Most
@Miss Bianca:
Is Paonia home to High Country News?
Miss Bianca
@Felixmoronia: I will likely be going up 92 thru’ the Black Canyon, but you tempt me strangely…maybe I’ll head down thru’ Montrose on the way back, and hit Orvis Hot Springs!
@A Ghost To Most: Indeed it is! I used to be quite friendly with many of the interns and writers there. The old intern house was right next door to mine, so for many years I got to know them all quite well!
Joel
@BlueDWarrior: I hate Ricketts, too, but if you’re bothered by wingnuts in ownership, there are maybe a dozen franchises across all professional sports that will make you happy.
A Ghost To Most
@Miss Bianca: if offroading is included, I’m in.
Adam L Silverman
@Miss Bianca: We had a great chaplain. He’s not just an Army chaplain, he’s also a lawyer, and he’s a Ghanan tribal king and is a cousin of the overall king. He’s a great guy. One of my favorite people.
http://www.stripes.com/news/chaplain-would-like-to-keep-ministering-to-troops-in-iraq-but-knows-a-tribe-in-ghana-wants-its-king-back-1.78269
Redshift
@dmsilev:
Yeah, that’s pretty obnoxious. I can’t imagine they seriously believe that anyone will accept “this person doesn’t like our candidate” as a credentials challenge. The only thing I can guess is that after they got the peacemaking concessions on the platform committee, Weaver is determined to keep pushing until the DNC says no, so he can keep claiming the only reason they lost is because the game was rigged against them.
And considering, based on the Nevada experience, that they have a good chunk of their supporters who are willing to believe that something as simple as the vote to accept the rules from the Rules Committee (a thing that happens at the beginning of every convention) is an attempt to “change the rules,” it’ll probably work.
NotMax
@Miss Bianca
Would have to put Moore’s tying up the entire DC Silver Age in a bittersweet two-parter as among the best things he’s done in comics, as well.
Miss Bianca
@A Ghost To Most: And why not? Why shouldn’t it be anything we want? Personally, I should adore a trip to Animas Forks! : )
@Adam L Silverman: Great Heavens, this story just gets better and better! Ghana is one of the countries I would most like to visit before I die.
Emma
@Adam L Silverman: You know the most interesting people EVER.
Miss Bianca
@NotMax: Well, OK…I guess I’ll have to read that one. Somehow I missed it back in the day.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Felixmoronia: There’s a Montrose here in Glendale.
Adam L Silverman
@NotMax: that one he hit out of the park!
Adam L Silverman
@Miss Bianca: He’s good people.
SiubhanDuinne
@Adam L Silverman:
It’s hard to remember after all these years, but I’m pretty sure this was the book that first caused me to fall in love with the idea of the Hebrides, or at least cemented that love once I had heard some traditional Hebridean music.
And, although I’ve read the book at least a couple of dozen times, I’m always drawn in by the lines scrawled on a newspaper next to an unidentified corpse:
“The beasts that talk,
the streams that stand,
the stones that walk,
the singing sand…”
I do hope you enjoy it!
Adam L Silverman
@Emma: not sure about that, but I’ve been fortunate to meet and work with some quality folks.
Adam L Silverman
@SiubhanDuinne: I had a couple of friends when I was at St. Andrews who was from the outer Hebrides. One I worked with and the other did aikido with us.
Adam L Silverman
@Miss Bianca: @efgoldman:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mfzuw9yS-T0
Miss Bianca
@SiubhanDuinne: I have read that one, but years ago – and good Heavens, now that I think about it may have influenced me as well – because God alone knows what made me insist that my one trip to Scotland included the Hebrides both inner and outer! I’ll have to reread Josephine Tey – haven’t since college days, but I remember she had a very elegant style of writing.
Miss Bianca
@Adam L Silverman: @efgoldman: Oy gevaldt!
So, this is a cultural thing? ; ) Because I seem to recall it was a Jewish friend who told me that her idea of camping was when room service was late…well, we’ll just have to find a big old house to take over, then!
Schlemazel Khan
@efgoldman:
Minor league games are better in a lot of ways. We get to 2-3 weekends in Cedar Rapids or Davenport just on a lark. Its AAA but the games are always entertaining & the crowds care more about the game so its a better experience. Me also catch a few Northwoods league games every summer. There are teams within a couple hours drive, tickets are like $5 and a beer is $4. The players are all college baseball players. They use wooden bats so I assume it is a chance to show MLB scouts what they can do.
dmsilev
@efgoldman: I walked that block every day on my way to high school (I grew up on Harvard Ave, so literally just around the corner).
Really?
@Redshift: I’m reading a biography on Stalin. It’s fascinating by itself but there a few pages that describe Stalin’s base whilst dealing with Zinovyev & Kamenev.
“To this bond must be added yet another which further united Stalin with his following, and which further estranged the Secretary-General’s faction from Bolsheviks of more cosmopolitan colouring; militant anti-intellectualism.
When Stalin invoked, as he repeatedly did, the image of whining, pathetic Party intellectuals alienated from life, from the workers, and from the revolution, he struck a particularly responsive chord in his followers. They had not attended university and they disliked theoretical argument. . . .
They preferred Stalin because they saw him as a man of action like themselves, not a man of words.”
TL,DR – Same shit different century.
(ETA) Joseph Stalin: Man and Legend, Ronald Hingley
redshirt
@Adam L Silverman: Without watching it, I’m not sure how you can have strong opinions about it. The show is not some shallow comic book. It’s quite aware of the subject matter.
hedgehog mobile
@Miss Bianca: Make it a weekend and I’m in:)
Adam L Silverman
@Miss Bianca: I’ve been camping. Its okay. I just like telling people “Jews don’t camp” and when they say what, playing the video for them.
Adam L Silverman
@redshirt: I think you either missed my point or I buried the point. So let me try to do it in a more concise way: I think Marvel’s treatment of the character in the comics, which is the basis for the character on the show, was bad. They needed a female character to abuse horribly as part of a plot device for a story arc and they simply chose the Jessica Jones one because no one would care. Had they done it to Storm or the then Ms. Marvel or Sue Storm there would have been an uproar. So I have little desire to watch the show because I have little desire to engage with the story arc its based on.
That doesn’t mean the show isn’t well done. Or that they didn’t do a good job with it. Or that the actor playing the character hasn’t done a good job. I’ve hear that the show is well done, that they did do a good job with it, and that the actor playing Jessica Jones did an outstanding job. Its just that the story doesn’t appeal to me.
Adam L Silverman
@efgoldman: The Da Vinci Code folks defaced Rosslyn Chapel. They smacked a prop Star of David carving above the lintel of the stairs that leads from the right side of the altar to the crypt. The contract did not allow them to alter anything in the interior. They didn’t ask, just did it. When they took it down it left a circular discoloration on the stone above the lintel.
Adam L Silverman
@efgoldman: I have no problem going out, hiking, and getting grungy. But I will say I do enjoy being able to take a hot shower and use a real toilet at the end of the day. But for a couple of days its okay.
redshirt
@Adam L Silverman: So you’re bringing a comics based opinion onto the TV show? If so, that’s short-sighting the creativity of the TV folks. It really is an awesome show. If you like Daredevil you’d like JJ.
Stella
@ThresherK: We walked over the Hudson a couple of years ago on a trip to visit the in-laws on LI. Nifty. We also visited Hyde Park on that trip.
Tom
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I was watching clips from season 1 this morning. This show has been strong from the first frame. I still think the pilot was the best drama I’d ever seen and I’ve watched it about four times so far. You get hooked in the first ten minutes.
Emma
@efgoldman: It’s a worry with many monuments. The good thing, if a negative can be considered good, is that most visitors to Stonehenge are checking off their list of sights. So, get off the tour bus, see the film, walk around the path, hit the souvenir store and the cafe , get back on the bus. Some of the places, like Durrington Walls, have almost nothing to see; they were wood structures mostly, although they have found what seem to be the remains of a stone monument recently. I think people who would bother with the whole landscape would be people like me, who have a semi-scholarly interest.
Felixmoronia
@efgoldman: So BJers are pink, purple & red with gold eyes. I’ll be on the look-out here on the western slope of CO.
Tissue Thin Pseudonym
@Miss Bianca:
As you know, I have a dog in this particular fight. What I can say is that, based upon everything of heard about the comparison (I stopped reading comics about a decade before Jessica Jones: Alias, the story arc that the TV is loosely based upon, came out), don’t rely upon someone who has read it, but not watched the show, to pass judgment on how the show deals with rape and misogyny. The show is harrowing and brutal, but it handles rape the right way, which the comics apparently did not.
The rapes are never actually shown. The story picks up about a year after Jessica Jones was controlled by Kilgrave, and there isn’t much of that time that’s shown. One key scene, which actually features Jessica Jones freeing herself from his control as well as another key plot element, is shown multiple times. There’s another of Kilgrave taking her to a restaurant.
It’s really more a story of recovering from rape than about rape itself. Kilgrave controls a lot of people over the course of the show, men and women, and destroys their lives. There’s nothing in it that depicts women as being especially prone to being victims; Kilgrave is definitely misogynistic, in that he seems to be pursuing, if not women in general, then at least one or two women in particular, while the horrific things he does to men that he controls are more incidental to his goals. The show, I’d argue, is not. It’s very hard to watch in places, but it’s telling this kind of story properly.
NotMax
@Adam L. Silverman
Camping is a young(er) person’s game. Been there, done that, got the T-shirt so grungy it’s best to bury it.
Never cared much for hot dogs or marshmallows, either.
And camping with morning people? The worst.
Emma
@Adam L Silverman: Aargh. I didn’t know that. Now that ticks me off. Rosslyn is one of the few places I have visited that have both awed me and creeped me out. It helped my sister and I got there early in the morning on a rainy day and were absolutely alone in the dark in the small foyer until one of the caretakers turned on the lights. I don’t know whether it’s the history/legends or just the atmosphere of an old Church but it was easy to fall into a superstitious mindset.
redshirt
@efgoldman: Sounds like it will be fully legal in MA in 2016 as well.
Adam L Silverman
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym: Just to clarify: I’m not arguing that anyone else shouldn’t watch it. I’m also not arguing that its not been done right. I’m simply saying that I’m not interested in it. If anyone else is – that’s great.
Really?
@Adam L Silverman: Dear Mr.Silverman – You are the best thing to happen to this blog in five (ten) years. May I ask you a direct question?
redshirt
@Adam L Silverman: I find this odd since JJ is part of the MCU and is part of and leading up to The Defenders Netflix show, which is a real thing and will feature JJ. Will you not watch it because she’s on the team?
Adam L Silverman
@NotMax: I like hot dogs and marshmallows with third degree burns on them, so I’m good there.
As for camping with morning people – I’m with you.
Tissue Thin Pseudonym
@redshirt:
I agree that forming an opinion on Jessica Jones based upon a strong reaction to, or hearing bad things about, Jessica Jones: Alias is a mistake, but this goes too far. The two shows are really very different once you get beyond the superficial similarities about featuring street level superheroes. Jessica Jones touches buttons that Daredevil never comes close to. On the other hand, the former doesn’t have nearly so many issues with physical violence, blood, and gore; Episode 10 is the only one that comes close to most of Daredevil, and in that instance, the violence and blood are used quite differently, and, in my opinion, far more effectively.
Jessica Jones really is not for everyone that likes Daredevil.
Tissue Thin Pseudonym
@Adam L Silverman: Which is fine. As I said above, Jessica Jones really isn’t for everyone. If the subject matter would make it an unpleasant watch, by all means, don’t watch it. My only point is that one shouldn’t avoid it because the source material for it handled the subject badly.
trollhattan
@schrodinger’s cat:
Post WWII. He was repatriated in 1955 with the end of the occupation after a decade in the gulag.
Adam L Silverman
@Emma: Did you go to the ruined Church and its graveyard down the road in Temple? Temple is associated with the Templars as both a Sinclair holding and also because the graveyard has a number of Templar graves. And, of course, the name.
Adam L Silverman
@Really?: Sure. And its Adam.
Adam L Silverman
@redshirt: I’m not sure I’m going to watch any of the shows other than Daredevil. I have no real investment in Powerman or Iron Fist. And little in Defenders. I have a friend that kept nudging me to watch Daredevil. I had to do some nephew sitting last weekend, my brother has Netflix, so I was able to knock out the first season.
redshirt
@Adam L Silverman: Sacre Bleu!
Felixmoronia
@efgoldman: The TGOPer county commisioners in their wisdom banned pot sales in the county and are losing out on all that sweet tax revenue, hence my comment about having a camp-out at Ridgeway S.P. It’s in Ouray county to the south. The first month of legal pot tax revenue in Ridgeway was more than all other taxes combined
Adam L Silverman
@redshirt: @Tissue Thin Pseudonym: I wasn’t looking to start a comment war about these shows. Nor the comic books they’re based on. I think Daredevil has been very well done – at least season 1 as that’s what I’ve seen so far. Everything I’ve heard about Jessica Jones indicates it was also excellently done. Its just not something I’m interested in. I appreciate that you both are, for perhaps different reasons, and I wasn’t trying to denigrate your viewing and/or reading choices. I think its great you the choices are there for those that want them and that there are finally opportunities to bring these episodic forms of storytelling to new mediums.
Adam L Silverman
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym: The subject matter doesn’t make it unpleasant to me. I’ve watched and read things that are far more horrific. I just don’t feel the need to watch or read the story arcs that use women as a throw away plot device or are based on such.
redshirt
@Adam L Silverman: I’m just surprised as a comics fan you’re not interested in these comic book TV shows.
But then I remember you’re DC and…..
Really?
@Adam L Silverman: It was a stupid bar bet about how many divisions we could field vs what we have. Damn you Android!!
Emma
@Adam L Silverman: Never got anywhere except the Chapel and Edinburgh that day. We had seen the Chapel and were starting the walk towards Rosslyn Castle, past the long arm of the cemetery when the skies opened up. It was, as they say over there, a right pish-oot, all bloody day. And we weren’t really on a Templar hunt, so we never made it.
Adam L Silverman
@redshirt: @redshirt: I wasn’t sure I was going to watch Legends of Tomorrow if that’s any consolation. I DVRed them and binged them in one sitting when I had a chance and that made it palatable for all its problems. I’ve had the same problem with Capaldi’s two seasons of Dr. Who. I love Capaldi as an actor, but I’ve had to force myself to watch both the seasons. I can’t put it into words, but something is just wrong with the show or his portrayal of the character or both or neither and its something else I’m missing since he took over the titular character. And I decided to not even bother with Batman V Superman: Dawn of Grimness. I may or may not, depending on how I feel, get the digital download when it comes out. And I’m very conflicted about getting the digital download of the Killing Joke, which would be the first of the DC Animated Universe movies that I didn’t buy and watch.
I’ve got funky tastes in reading and viewing materials. And often limited time for both. None of this is meant as a commentary on your reading and/or viewing choices. I’m glad we’ve reached the point that they can take the characters and stories you love and get them onto TV and in movies.
Tissue Thin Pseudonym
@Adam L Silverman:
This is our disconnect. Jessica Jones does not use women as a throw away plot device. It doesn’t come close, even if the original source material did. As I said, there are plenty of valid reasons not to watch it, but this isn’t one of them.
Adam L Silverman
@Really?: Army Divisions?
Adam L Silverman
@Emma: I’ll dig out the digital pics of Rosslyn and Temple and throw them in a post for you at some point. I have to do at least one comic book post for redshirt first and something on the thugee for Schrodinger.
So much to blog, so little time…
Emma
@Adam L Silverman: Thank you! That would be fun.
Redshift
@Adam L Silverman: I had the rather bizarre experience of visiting Rosslyn Chapel a could of years after The Da Vinci Code was published, having no idea about the connection. It was way more crowded than anywhere else we visited, though we quickly found out why. (I imagine it was even worse after the movie.)
It was interesting, but I agree the ruined church was much more scenic (and not just because it was less crowded.)
Really?
@Adam L Silverman: It was 3 Brigades x 5,000 = 15,000 = 1 Division.
Miss Bianca
@Adam L Silverman: I’m not a big camper myself. But the beautiful thing about living where I do is that I don’t have to be.
ETA: I like my marshmallows toasted black.
bmoak
@Adam L Silverman:
Umm, although Jessica Jones the comic book character was presented as having a backstory as a former superhero with a lot of interactions with the Marvel Universe, it was all a retcon, as her first appearance was in Alias #1, set years after her superhero career. I’ve seen lots of people complain that Marvel ruined an existing superheroine to launch Alias/Jessica Jones, which was not the case.
Adam L Silverman
@Emma: Just checked, the pics are right where I thought they were.
Really?
@bmoak: As someone who hast not yet witnessed JJ I would say the attraction is like that .gif LGF has been using for years.
Adam L Silverman
@Redshift: I’ve been several times. I took my folks when they visited when I lived in Scotland in 95. And I was there again in early 2008 for a long weekend before we deployed to Iraq. Went to visit friends in Scotland and one of my teammates came with. That’s when we found out about the damage caused by the movie. This was also the time period when they had the metal cover over the building as they were trying to stabilize it and keep it from disintegrating.
Adam L Silverman
@Really?: I think you’re question is about the Army Force Generation Cycle, which is usually referred to as ARFORGEN for short. Currently we have three Army corps: I Corps based at Joint Base Lewis McChord, commanded by LTG Lanza (full disclosure: I’ve done work for him in the past, as well as for one of his predecessors as I Corp Commander); XVIII Airborne Corps at Ft. Bragg, commanded by LTG Townsend (full disclosure: I’ve done work for him before), and III Corps at Ft. Hood, commanded by LTG MacFarland (full disclosure: I served as Temporarily Assigned Control/TACON Cultural Advisor for III Corps in 2012 when it was commanded by LTG Campbell). Each of these corps is made up of several divisions, though I Corps set up is a bit funky – there primary division is set up not to deploy, but to function from the rear. Each of the Divisions is made up of several Brigade Combat Teams (BCTs).
All of this is the result of force modernization (full disclosure: one of the major players behind Force Modernization is a close friend and former teammate and, perhaps, the most knowledgable and experience concept and doctrine guy that the Army has on its payroll). The whole point of Force Modernization is that everything is plug and play so you get what you need where and when you need. So if we have to send a Corps to be the theater command element and we’re going for a heavier footprint, like during Operation Iraqi Freedom, then it may have Divisions that are normally aligned/allocated to other Corps and those Divisions may have BCTs aligned/allocated to other Divisions.
Hope this helps.
ETA: I professionally feel we are one corps too light. I understand why they stood down V Corps a couple of years ago, but given the current operational needs and requirements, having the additional 3 star headquarters would be useful.
Adam L Silverman
@bmoak: That’s not my complaint. My issue, if I can use the term, was that they felt the need to write a long story arc that essentially abused, degraded, humiliated, a female character. And while this included physical rape, it also included taking her identity and mental autonomy away as well. This is simply not the type of story I’m interested in reading.
ETA: I’m also not interested in reading that type of story if it did the same thing to a male character.
Really?
@Adam L Silverman: Wow, I knew you were good but that is fascinating! I apologize for wasting your valuable time!
PurpleGirl
@PaulWartenberg2016: In my Con going days, I usually got a hotel room at the con, even for a con in NYC. I got to like being able to go back to a room to sleep and relax instead of trudging home. I highly recommend it.
Adam L Silverman
@Really?: No waste. Your and everyone else’s tax dollars ultimately paid for me to learn about this stuff, even if it was on the job experiential learning. Provided I can answer the question, there’s kind of an obligation to do so. If you do a key word search for each corps, by name, and organization chart, you’ll get a pretty good idea of what each one has assigned to it. They may not be perfectly up to date as of today, but it’ll be close enough to get you accurate info. Or just go to their home page and click the link for subordinate units. You’ll get the unit’s leadership, its history, and where its home station is.
Matt McIrvin
@pseudonymous in nc: Some of them really, really think that Trump running away from Bernie will convince the superdelegates to give Bernie the nomination.
Really?
@Adam L Silverman: Most of the questions come from sources that aren’t reliable but — https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?threads/naval-plans-for-the-worlds-naval-powers.529044/
Is the kind of thing I love. “Can you build Five King George V BBs before 193x?
Really?
@Adam L Silverman: I went to college with a few navy men. You would put them to shame.
PurpleGirl
@Mnemosyne: Well, I’m reading comments here, I have Mysteries at the Museum on the TV, and a Kitten Cam (currently minimized) available to watch.
NotMax
@redshirt
Longtime (now former) comic book reader here, too, and also have not the slightest interest in viewing either program.
Ruckus
@Adam L Silverman:
I’ve never met anyone at the VA who needs to be called by the rank they obtained. And some of them obviously care for they wear hats/vests/patches/pins with insignia, for example a paratrooper pin. The other half show no signs of having been in the military at all, other than being where they are.
PurpleGirl
@Adam L Silverman: I think I recently watched that show. Do you remember which cable channel it was on?
There was another show about a professor from the US who is doing satellite mapping of Egypt and believes she has from a whole bunch of pyramids.
Ancient Egypt and Stonehenge and other stone monuments have been interests/passions of mine since childhood. I check the TV listings to see when shows will be on. I’ll even rewatch them. The Smithsonian Channel has a few good ones.
PurpleGirl
@NotMax: Professor Sarah Parcak (?spelling) of University of Alabama is using satellite pictures to guide her project of mapping Egypt. She believes she has found a whole bunch of pyramids.
(See my comment @ 292 to Adam.)
A couple of English professors have been using ground-penetrating radar to map vast swaths of areas around Stonehenge.
PurpleGirl
@schrodinger’s cat: Bob Ballard (Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute) who found the Titanic has done a bit of underwater archeology/oceanography. I saw a TV documentary he did on the (Biblical) flood being a breaking through of the Dardenelles linking two ancients seas.
Major Major Major Major
@PurpleGirl: Would you say he’s been… digging into the Dardenelles theory?
*puts sunglasses on and phones in rest of episode*
PurpleGirl
@BillinGlendaleCA: There is also Montrose in Westchester Cty, NYS. It’s on the east side of the Hudson River.
Origuy
@PurpleGirl: She is also the person who recently found a second Viking camp on Newfoundland using satellite photos. There is a program that I believe is running on PBS about it. (I watched on BBC iPlayer before the BBC managed to block Hola’s proxy server.)
I saw Roslyn in 2003 before The Da Vinci Code got big. It was covered with scaffolding for restoration, but at least there were no crowds. There’s also a cool ruined castle nearby, Crichton Castle. Of course there are cool ruins everywhere in Scotland.
ETA Crichton has a GOT connection. William Lord Crichton was partly responsible for the “Black Dinner” which inspired the “Red Wedding” of GOT.
jim parente
@Adam L Silverman: Adam, check out Frontline: “The Business of Disaster”. It aired this week. It looks at the horrible state of disaster relief in this country.
It discusses Superstorm Sandy “recovery”, the corrupt relationship between the insurance industry and the NFIP and the obscenely excessive ($400,000,000.00) profits reaped by said industry.
I am one of those whose life was destroyed by this horrible cabal.
Another Holocene Human
@Adam L Silverman: Not fair, Watchmen does eventually get to the point. The problem is that it’s written more for an English major than a me spel gud wun day STEM geek like me. I read everything but didn’t get half of it. Also, Moore is very nostalgic for a racist past that he knows he can only enjoy ironically. The reactionary character turns out to be right in the end. There’s a lot of meta commentary in Watchmen, it’s not just jacking off to putting established characters in a literally world ending scenario. Oh, and the movie was complete garbage.
J R in WV
@burnspbesq:
No, no. We WISH it was the last straw. But we kinda know it won’t be. If he had a real chance to win, he would have a point, but since he has LOST there is no point there to be had. What a fuck-knuckle cluster they are.
Adam L Silverman
@Ruckus: I think its more of the ones who eventually retire to Florida and try to take over the Home Owners Associations and expect everyone to take a measuring stick to the grass in their yards kind of problem.
But I’ve met a couple.
Adam L Silverman
@PurpleGirl: It was on one of the two PBS stations down here. Full video at the link:
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/secrets/cleopatras-lost-tomb-full-episode/2909/
J R in WV
@Adam L Silverman:
My Dad always said he would take up backpacking when we figured out a way he could have a vodka-tonic on the rocks in the evenings before dinner…
I just decided to go with good bourbon, neat, in that case. Worked for me. But Dad grew into a vodka-tonic guy.
When Dad visited my brother in Provo while Bro briefly worked for Novell, he hated that the V-T they made him was exactly 1 oz of V to a glass of tonic, and no way to get another oz before finishing the first one. Nearly enraged at how bad that drink was.
It was bad by law everywhere in Utah! My Bourbon neat was OK, just small.
Adam L Silverman
@Another Holocene Human: I just didn’t like it. So I stopped reading it. I have a number of friends who thought it was the best comic book ever. And that’s fine too. It just wasn’t for me.
Adam L Silverman
@J R in WV: One of the few states I’ve never been to is Utah. I think its because its Constitution was written by Alan Moore and the Marvel guys who wrote the Jessica Jones story arc I don’t like.
(just checking to see who’s still reading this dead thread)
More seriously, I’ve heard that mixology was a lost, or perhaps never discovered, art form for most of Utah for most of its history as a state.
amused
@Adam L Silverman: Longtime lurker here. Totally agree with you on jj. I loved dd but couldn’t finish jj because of the rape stalker aspect. Not my type of entertainment. The show was well done but I couldn’t get how jj had any friends. She’s hateful to everyone. Also, I didn’t want to remember my favorite doctor like that. Agree about Capaldi.
Adam L Silverman
@amused: It is what it is. I’m glad that the stories and shows are available for those that enjoy them, but in the former its not really my cup of tea and in regard to the latter, I’m not sure whether I’m missing some nuance in the portrayal or something else is going on.
And no need to lurk the strum and drang is not as bad as it seems.
Miss Bianca
@Adam L Silverman: OK, I finally got a chance to actually watch this…since the Adobe Flash has decided it doesn’t like my little old laptop anymore…and holy God that is funny. Probably not the smartest idea to watch it in the library, but I managed to restrain myself.
I’ll go out on a limb here and claim this as an interfaith sentiment. This gentile prefers cabins to tents.