I Don’t Even 2012

December 31, 2012

This year began with what felt like a theme park boat ride, the craft drifting into a dark tunnel, and up ahead you can hear the splashing of rough waters, as the drifting boat moves steadily quicker. To… what?

Well, to all this…

January: Sorting Socks

-Starting the year with something sweet. And Brookside.
-Rocky Horror Picture Show at WES: your argument has never been so invalid
-Ow! Why is my side hurting now?
-And why is… my chest pain back?! Noooo!
-Ash is dead! Ash lasted a while. Awww. 🙁
-And now I don’t feel so good…
-Stomach virus! Ack! Haven’t had one in eleven years!
-Supervisor: “Stomach virus? WTF? Go home!”
-Me: “I have to change the temperature chart first!”
-A NYRA board meeting that didn’t devolve into fighting? Holy crap!
Continue reading “I Don’t Even 2012”

DC Sports

December 30, 2012

So this past spring, the Washington Capitals got into the NHL playoffs. They usually do. They’re a good team, despite the city for which they play. They were playing against the New York Rangers, for best four out of seven, when we were six seconds from winning Game Six, and therefore the whole thing and going forward. But then the Rangers scored and tied it up and won in overtime. And Rangers won Game Seven. Caps had it… and lost it.

Then the Washington Nationals, who usually suck, had a great year. And, look at that, National League East Champions, got into the playoffs! It was best three out of five against the St. Louis Cardinals. We made it to Game Five, after Jayson Werth’s walkoff homerun saved Game Four for us. We began Game Five with a six to nothing lead on the Cardinals. Then they seemed to be scoring a run each inning… But then it was the ninth inning, we were up by two still, and were just one strike away from winning and going on… we kept walking them and then they hit a couple of base hits, giving them the lead, and we lost nine to seven. Fuck. -_-

And now, the Washington Redskins, having gotten into November having a typical craptastic season, has just won six straight games in a row, in the running to get into the playoffs. Beat the Eagles. Then beat the Cowboys on Thanksgiving! Then beat the Giants. Then the Ravens. Then the Browns. Then the Eagles again. And tonight we have to beat the Cowboys again, so we can get into the playoffs. Otherwise, we don’t but the Cowboys do.

I’m scared. :scared:

Go Redskins!!!!

EDIT: FUCK YEAH!!!!! 28 to 18!!!!! 😀

Wait, shit, we play the Seahawks next week. Our last two playoff berths ended against them. Oy…

It Should Have Been Neville

December 29, 2012

Alright, here’s another Harry Potter gripe.

Complete with Harry Potter spoilers, in case that’s an issue five years after the final book came out and a year and a half after that book’s movie.

Bellatrix Lestrange.

She was all-around terrible, having among many other things killed Sirius Black, tortured Hermione, and crucio’d Neville Longbottom’s parents into permanent brain damage.

But who kills her in the end? Molly fucking Weasley.

I mean, that is what brings us the famous “NOT MY DAUGHTER, YOU BITCH!” line, as Molly went toward Bellatrix when she saw she was battling with Ginny at the time, and was already grief-stricken from having lost Fred.

But it should have been Neville. True, true, Neville already showed his stuff in slicing Nagini in half with the Gryffindor sword. Yet it seemed like part of his growing strength should have also included avenging his parents. After finishing off Nagini, he should have sliced off Bellatrix’s head.

Instead, Molly Weasley had the honors. Yeah, she was clearly aching to show her badass side, too, after all the coddling she does the rest of the series. Just seems like Augustus Rookwood, who caused the explosion that killed Fred, should have been the better target. Or at least Antonin Dolohov, who killed the Gideon and Fabian Prewett, who were her brothers.

Or maybe she was avenging Sirius, with whom she had some constant friction. That’s a weirdly sweet way of looking at it.

Still, though… Neville was due! :doitnow:

Seventh Anniversary

December 28, 2012

Yup, Eight Mine Fortress is seven years old today. I’m so proud! 😀

Seven years of sitting here with whatever crazy crap I write to it.

On to the eighth year… of Eight Mine Fortress.

Ha. This anniversary post next year is going to make a stupid joke about that. 🙄

Well, two more until the 2012 recap…

Why, Animaniacs? Why?

December 27, 2012

Why the “Katie Ka-Boom” segment? What the fuck?

I watched this show 20 years ago, though rather on and off. Why? Because every now and then, some of the segments just bugged me. Really, I think the only ones I consistently liked were the Yakko, Wakko, and Dot ones, and maybe Slappy and Skippy, Goodfeathers, and Rita and Runt. The rest is either frustrating, like Mindy and Buttons. Stupid, like Chicken Boo. And, of course, just wildly offensive like Katie Ka-Boom.

There was a marathon of it on the Hub on Christmas Eve, and I like their Christmas specials. And seems the show is coming on that channel regularly in January. First thought was, yay, I like that show, get to see an old show of mine again! Then I remembered the love-hate relationship with it, that so many segments of the show I prefer to change the channel from.

Particularly Katie Ka-Boom, the teenage girl who explodes in hulk-like fury at the slightest unhappiness, something of which her parents and little brother live in constant fear. Every segment has something frustrate her, usually her family doing something stupid or a guy being a minute late for a date, and then she screams and turns into some kind of fire-breathing monster or some shit, and afterward she reverts to normal and is even friendly, and to close out the segment her parents make some disgusting comment about teenagers.

There’s a certain sadness in seeing blatant anti-teen sentiment in cartoons meant for an audience that has yet to reach their teen years (“fingerprints” joke notwithstanding). Spongebob Squarepants is about as bad when Mr. Krabs’s daughter Pearl is in an episode, behaving like every teen girl stereotype the show’s writers could come up with.

Why are children being told that in a few years they are going to grow into an age group during which they’ll be horrible and their parents will hate them? Or is this being done hoping the kids will behave differently once they reach their teens? Except their behavior doesn’t actually matter, since all anyone will care about then is their age, and every single action they make will be derided as “stupid teenager”. They can’t win, and their elders just want to make fun of them for it. What the fuck?

A Perversion of Darwinism

December 26, 2012

You know what I fucking hate? Ridiculous and fallacious applications of survival of the fittest to human society. And it’s almost always made to mean not so much survival but rather lack of survival of the weak or stupid. While this does apply in certain areas, the idea goes way overboard a lot, to the point of sociopathy.

For example, when looking at history, one might look at, say, the conquest and deaths of the Native Americans at the hands of white settlers to be what can be expected naturally. Why? Because a nice dose of Social Darwinism states that the Native Americans were clearly the weaker and less fit party, that therefore they’d only lose out to the surviving white settlers because they were clearly the fit and strong ones. And that with the weak ones dying out and those strong ones surviving, this would somehow be beneficial to our species.

Another example. A few years ago, I wrote about kids being left to die in hot cars. The comment on that was someone signed in as “Darwin” and saying, “See my theory of Evolution for an explanation of the purpose of this behavior.” That post was mentioned in a forum thread on SnipeMe last year, and the comment got a bit of agreement. Well, there are a lot of problems with that! For one, it reduces the child from personhood and makes him merely a vessel for his parents’ supposedly-faulty genes. And for that reason makes out the child’s unfortunate death to be a good thing for our species! Not to mention that the death had nothing to do with anything the child did, that this death was because his parents killed him through THEIR neglect and stupidity.

It also broadly applies biological determinism where its appropriateness is at best poorly understood by even the people who actually would know what the fuck they are talking about.

And where the fuck does anyone come off saying the deaths of innocent children at the hands of stupid parents, or tribes at the hands of resource-hungry invaders, or any number of people who died in avoidable accidents, are beneficial to our species? That one would make a statement so outrageously callous and defend it by pretending it’s science?!

You see, there is something very advantageous to our species, and that is our ability to discover and solve problems and, you know, help each other! We are supposed to be well beyond leaving the little sick and weak ones to die, so to speak. We are supposed to know better than to assume only those whose genes are “correct” have a right to live. Because maybe, just maybe, we’ve evolved into being better than that!

Gelukkig Kerstfeest

December 25, 2012

It began with some gift gathering and organization. Eating some cookies.

And, look at that, it’s snowing outside!

And after some wrapping, some Christmas TV, and whatnot, scraping off the car.

Christmas Eve.

Sushi!

Off to late night church. The usual.

Except for some weird “riu riu chiu” song they sung.

And at last… Silent Night.

I might have shouted the third verse for some reason: “RADIANT BEAMS FROM THY HOLY FACE! WITH THE DAWN OF REDEEMING GRAAAAAAAACE!”

And stepped outside…

o snap, it’s a foggy Christmas Eve!

And the last of the wrapping.

And cookies and hot chocolate!

Bed.

In the morning, a bizarre AC/DC parody of “My Favorite Things”.

Also, the Christmas tree fell down last night and is propped up against the wall.

LOL awesome

The brand new train didn’t work.

Until it did on a different track. Weird.

Mario games, old and new!

And the feast. The feast of roast beast.

Unremarkable. Unwavering from last year. For the most part.

I guess that’s a good thing. It is a good thing. Nice to have some things be somewhat constant.

I don’t know. I’m not interested in thinking too hard about it.

Hope you all had a good one!

Same Old Songs

December 23, 2012

New Christmas music gets made still. Sort of. I think Rod Stewart released a new Christmas album. Michael Buble released one a year or two ago. Plenty of singers like to do the usual Christmas album, because why not?

Except it’s usually the same damn songs. Do we really need more versions of Let It Snow, or It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas, or It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year, or I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus? Or any others that have already been done to death?

Writing a new Christmas song, of course, takes extra work, and God knows that one is a crapshoot anyway. You might get something fun like Christmas Wrapping, something cute like Dominick the Donkey, something depressing like Same Auld Lang Syne, or something godawful and fit for the bowels of hell like Christmas Shoes.

But there’s a zillion Christmas songs already, lots of material for an album of covers. They don’t need to stick to the same old ones. There isn’t a lot of chance they’re going to contribute much to them that hasn’t been done before. Just open up a few Christmas song books and look for stuff that people might generally know but doesn’t get done much. Even excluding the Jesus ones (an exclusion not usually made, though) there’s still a decent selection.

And yet even with all that considered, they’ll still be like “hey, you know what? there should be another rendition of Santa Claus Is Coming to Town!”

Either that, or the same old Santa Claus Is Coming to Town or Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree are the only ones anyone is willing to promote or play. :irked:

The Difference a Y Makes

December 22, 2012

So, in response to Sandy Hook, the National Rifle Association came out and said words.

On one hand, you’d hate to be them right now, immediately after an incident where everything they stand for just feels especially evil.

On the other hand, what the NRA does end up saying is some stupid shit.

They’re calling for ARMED GUARDS in every school. So in response to one guy with a gun going into a school and shooting some little kids, let’s have every school have a guy with a gun who has a lot more access should he decide to do the same! Genius!

Oh, and they blamed violent video games.

So, basically, guns don’t kill people, but video games do! Of course!

You know… personally I don’t feel very strongly about gun rights either way, but if this is the thought process of those who choose to carry deadly weapons around, I’m thinking there’s something to this whole gun control thing after all!

The Sun Returns

December 21, 2012

I went outside earlier and looked up at the sky. Though mostly cloudy, to the south I could see it. A weak, distant sun.

Alright, sun. Come on back.

To which the sun replied, “Why should I?”

Because it’s the winter solstice. It’s dark here.

“But when I leave this nice Tropic of Capricorn, it’s gets dark in the south. Why are you so special?”

Not a matter of special. It’s just time.

“That’s your only reason? It’s just time? What if I want to stay over here?”

Pretty sure that’d be a natural disaster.

“And why should I care about that? You know, Earth, you are some piece of work. Expecting everything from me.”

We can’t help that.

“Not that you are so appreciative. Six months ago, when I was shining all brightly around you and leaving the south in the dark, weren’t you all just bitching about the heat?”

True, true.

“And why should I shine anywhere on your stupid planet? The crap you all do to each other. Should just let you all rot in darkness.”

We’re much more than just humans.

“Yeah, well, don’t get me started on spiders!”

And even so, what is this? Your own little naughty or nice list?

“Please! Santa is the one who stole that shit from me!”

Okay.

“But you know what I hate most of all? You humans and your little solstice celebrations and the like. I send light and energy your way, and you all decide to attach more shit to me than that. I’m a star that happens to be close to you. And you benefit from me and have life. A life of stupidity.”

Um… sorry?

“Stupidity! In that every six months, whichever hemisphere is dark wants me to come back the other way, but I’m not even the one who moved. It’s your own stupid planet that keeps spinning around me and tilting certain ways at certain times, and yet I catch flak for it. Well, I’ve had it.”

Going to turn yourself off? Going supernova so fast?

“No. I’ll just let you have what you want. Your northern days will steadily get brighter now, from your own planetary revolving and tilting. But come summer I’m giving you some massive heat!”

Well, okay. Though if all you actually do is sit there and cast out light and energy, some of which happens to reach us, how much control do you have over that?

“No need. Your greenhouse gases are doing that one well enough.”

Um… I think I’ll just go Christmas shopping now…

“You do that.”