Yahtzee

Todays Score to Beat: 438
High Score is Still: 485

Archie Does Revelation

Here is something of interest for you, it is the Spire Comics adaptation of There's a New World Coming (it's 4+ mb .pdf file), a "wonderful" book about the coming rapture by Hal Lindsey, author of another "wonderful" book that resides on my bookshelf called Satan is Alive and Well on Planet Earth. (I would suggest right clicking and downloading unless you have a fast connection)

Lindsey was the 70's version of Jack Van Impe, or Jenkins and LeHaye of Left Behind Fame-big on the rapture and the antichrist, short on the actual thought.

The comic is drawn in a very Archie like style, and takes a group of kids on a groovy trip through the book of revelation. If you ever wanted to indoctrinate your children into the Left Behind phenomena (though why should you have to? Aren't all the children going to get a get into heaven free card according to the books?) this might be a good place for you to start.



This may be a book written for kids of hippies, but Jesus sure looks like an ass-kicker. He's got a purpose and it's puttin a whoopin on the devil and the antichrist. It surely is a Jesus Rally Random-Flying-Kid. Jesus looks like he's going to go kick some ass. No time for lazying about, no sir, it's time for the second coming.

I mean, look at him, he's happy, but he's prepared to visit plagues and whatnot on you. I'm guessing that his preparation for the rapture is to walk across a field of flowers in front of all the raptured children who fly through a whirly-swirly vortex behind him. Also, this panel answers the burning theological question: Yes, Virginia, there are sheep in heaven. It's not just a metaphor, and the Scotts can rejoice. (it does bring up the touchy question of if there are sheep in heaven and grass for them to eat, how is heaven any different from Earth? I mean besides the whirly-twirly vortexes and briskly walking Jesuses? If the sheep need to eat grass to stay alive in heaven, does that mean that there is death in Heaven? Doesn't that mean that there would be a Heaven's Heaven? Would that make Earth Heaven's Hell? Perhaps I over-think the inclusion of the sheep in the panel.)

This isn't really a very good comic in the areas of storytelling or character. We're not given much background on the kids involved, or really any story on them at all beyond that they seem to be tripping on acid and reading Revelation.



I'm not really sure what the message of the panel to the left was supposed to be. If I were of a less pure mind I might think that the blond headed kid is referring to the girl in the red dress that he is looking at, but that would be a bit of a wrong message for a book like this (and is the kid right below her staring up at the heavens or her chest?). If indeed she is a character from the book of Revelation, why have I never heard of her in church? I don't think his exclamation really answers the other kid's question, but, who knows. Also, wouldn't those involved in the rapture have a good idea of what was going on? I'm pretty sure that LB tells me that those who don't know, or don't accept this particular strain of Christianity are doomed to be Left Behind. (Also wouldn't someone known as "The Great Snatch!!!" most likely be left behind? Just a thought)



Ah, the first panel of the next page seems to explain it. That girl in the red dress was indeed, "The Great Snatch!!!," because this girl in the green shirt and blue hat is "The Rapture!!!" These must all be groovy superhero names, what with all these flying teenagers. This begs the question, where are all the adults in this comic version of the rapture. I realize this is a book targeted at young people, but aren't they going to find it odd that there are no adults going with them up into Heaven? Again, I ask, wouldn't everyone involved in the actual rapturing know what was going on? Shouldn't it be the people on Earth who are all confused?

I'm pretty sure the chick in the blue shirt and red pants in the bottom right of this panel is Veronica from Archie, but I don't see any of the other Riverdale crew around. We know that Jughead wouldn't make it since he's Muslim, and Archie is Catholic, but why not Betty? She's a good, nice girl. I always thought that Veronica was the bad girl in that book. Why does she get taken up and not Betty? And it all leaves the question, what about Moose?

In case you were wondering when all of this is supposed to happen, they provide you with a handy timeline to provide you with a visual representation of the situation:



I hope that solves any questions that you had about the rapture. I am left wondering if there was an Eternity in the past, and an Eternity in the future, what does Eternity mean? Doesn't it mean, you know, forever? How do you have a forever, then something, then more forever? I realize that these are "Things we aren't supposed to know," but if we can figure out what God's Outline of History is, shouldn't we be able to make it make a little more sense?

After a careful review of that chart I come to the conclusion that we are in the Messiah's kingdom which will last for 1000 years, since the entire period of the New Testament occurs in the space of seven years (unless the chart isn't to scale, but wouldn't God be a little more careful with his outlines?)

It is comforting to know that the entirety of Creation is just God's Term Paper. I would imagine that he has a big ass set of note-cards laying around somewhere with all his facts on it as well. I'd really like to see God's Bibliography though. I bet that would be some wild stuff.



You know, forget Russia and her Arab Allies, doesn't this kid need a punch in the eye? He looks a lot like Johnny Quest in this panel, and that alone should get him punched. Also, I may be mistaken, but I don't think that Israel is an island. Perhaps it is going to become one during the Rapture, but I'm not sure.



Just remember kids, God's judgement is so poetic. (Even though the panel to the right only refers to the death of the whore of Babylon, forgetting the fact that the antichrist still releases Satan from the pit right afterwards). It seems the girl over Johnny Needs-a-Punch is very shocked by his statement. I imagine he said it with a little smirk and a snort. He seems that type of guy.

I hope that you all have enjoyed this briefest of glimpses inside this wonderful comic, and perhaps you will download it and read it in it's entirety, allowing it's glorious light to shine into the darkest recesses of your soul and to bring you peace.

Or at the very least you'll worry about that ass-kicking Jesus and his Hydrogen Bombs that will eventually blow up the planet in another thousand and ten years or so.

God's Judgement is So Poetic, and badly drawn.






I found this through the Slacktivist's Left Behind Critique Page. He's going through the book page by page (something I'm not sure if I could do) and providing a counterpoint and commentary to the book.

I found that through BoingBoing by the way.

Merry Christmas and Whatnot

I hope the holidays find everyone well. They've found me well enough.

Right now I'm sitting here watching my sister play Simpson's Hit and Run on her new Playstation 2. She seems to enjoy just randomly kicking pedestrians as much as I do. The game is a re-working of Grand Theft Auto, and features a little more platforming style action, with the gathering of coins and jumping about. It impresses me, if for no other reason, than the fact that Cletus the slack-jawed yokel has a moderate supporting role. It's GTA without the killing or the hookers, but with some of the violence and profanity. Fun for the whole family.

I'll talk at you all later.

Comments

Well, sheeit, I done got a comment from Mr. Cory Doctorow hisself. I am quite the honored individual.

(Assuming that it really was him and not Tommy pretending to be him like he did on my old site when he e-mailed me pretending to be Hulk Hogan after I said something bad about the Hulkster).

Alert level: Yummy Mummy

Don't worry folks we're all Yummy Mummy. Take a moment to stop and breathe deeply and remember that anything could happen to you at any time anyway. It doesn't really matter to us Joes if there are dirty bombs or vague, unspecified threats on anyone and everything.

Make sure to watch out at every gathering of people, commies-i mean terrorists- could be anywhere. Take a moment to look around you, your classmates, your friends, anyone of them could be a mutant, a person born with strange and wondrous powers. Now some mutants like the X-Men use their powers for good, but then there are the evil, terrorist mutants who want to destroy the human race!

The graphic comes from Goopymart by way of bOINGbOING

Rush

Attorney's for Rush Limbaugh are claiming that he was blackmailed by his former drug dealer and that the state leaked the information.

To me the question is not whether or not he was blackmailed, but if he was illegally obtaining and using drugs. In the article it says that his former housekeeper/dealer was the one that went to the Enquirer and broke the story. I find it amazing that he claims that the 2,000 some odd painkillers were legitimate. Don't celebrities have to get re-fills of prescriptions like the rest of us? I don't think those pills come by the thousands, and why would you be getting them from your housekeeper? (unless your housekeeper happens to be a doctor)

I'm wondering what Rush's views on drug users were before this case. I'm sure in all of his voluminous oration on the airwaves and in his books that he has come down on a side, and I'm willing to bet he's of throw-all-of-em-in-jail variety.

Anybody out there know? I'm a Gordon listener not a Dittohead.

Yahtzee

Today's Yahtzee score to beat 454
High Score is still 485

Electronic Yahtzee is a devilish invention. Unlike a gameboy, there is no end to the games, only the impulse to always do better and the quest for the Yahtzee, and the cruel mocking face of the game when it will not give you a damn four when you need it to complete a large straight, but then will give you nothing but fours on the next game when you don't need them.

Pictures

I figured I'd share a few pictures from my crap digi-cam today:

First up is a view of a ceiling. See if you can guess where it is! There isn't a prize!

Next is the sky from a few weeks ago from the parking lot of the Murfreesboro K-Mart.

This is the Adams Family shocker game at the theater.

Some crap in one of those crane games.

I hope you have enjoyed this experience as much as I have.

From Jehovah's Witness to Militant Islamic

So Jacko has joined the Nation of Islam. He already has the military suits, glasses and berets to wear.

I'm just looking forward to the inevitable press conferences with Jacko/Farrakhan that are surely now in the works. That "racist devil" Tommy Mottola better watch out when they get done with these charges and Tom Sneddon.

Gordon and Ollie

I was just on the way back home and was listening to The Steve Gill Show on and off (I would put up with callers as much as I could until I had to turn the radio off for a few minutes), and his guest was Oliver North. Ollie was going on about those loonie liberals, Madeline (Not-so-bright as Steve called her) Albright, Howard Dean and Wesley Clark (who he called something along the lines of an armchair brigadier). He was wondering how they could even consider that the capture of Saddam might not make Americans safer, or that Albright could even float the possibility that the Administration knew where Saddam was or had him already and were just waiting on the proper moment to publicize it (Stephen Grant suggests that they are using it to smokescreen the Halliburton flap and I think he may be right).

This got me to thinking along different lines. What does it say about the right that two of their big talking heads: Ollie and G. G. Liddy are both convicted criminals? Does it help that a third, Rush Limbaugh, is involved in illegal drugs? Doesn't this bespeak of a little bit of a double standard?

Clinton lies about an affair, but Ollie sells guns to the Iranians and then uses it to fund the Contras and this is viewed as a minor transgression. He was, after all, just following orders (Clinton was following orders as well, they were just communiques from his pants).

I can at least respect Gordon, he may be a crook, but he doesn't lie about it (at least not that he's been caught on). I don't get any of that from Ollie or Rush. Ollie finds it laughable that the capture of Saddam doesn't make us any safer, but I know for sure what didn't make us any safer, selling arms to the Iranians.

I'm not sure what my point is.

Why couldn't the GOP have run McCain for president? I would have voted for him, now if the GOP are to be listened to, I'll have to vote for Dean, who I don't find very trustworthy.

Why can't the Democrats run McCain for president? I'd still vote for him.

Not Santa

I figure everybody's seen the image at the left by now. It shows a bedraggled Saddam Hussein in US hands after spending quite some time on the run in Iraq.

The first story I read about it said solidiers removed a fake beard from Saddam after finding him. My question is, is the beard in the picture at the left the fake one before it was taken off, or after the fake one was taken off?

In my mind I imagine that when they found him he had a large, curly, white Santa Claus beard on over the one pictured. Either that, or he had one of the beard's with the hooks that go over the ears that the women wore in Life of Brian when they were sneaking into the stoning.

LXG

Since League of Extraordinary Gentlemen came out on DVD yesterday let me again reiterate how much I loathed the film.

Remember the scene in Last Action Hero where the Governator's Jack Slater is playing Hamlet? That was taking a great and finely written tale and turning it into a big, stupid action movie. I found that humorous.

Taking The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen by Alan Moore and Kevin O'Neil and turning it into a big, stupid action movie is not funny.

Not funny at all.

Reading Material

Cory Doctorow's writing is so consistently good that it is a bit frightening. I read his novel Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom after Warren Ellis talked about it on DiePunyHumans. (you can download the book for free as Cory's site).

It's a good read and worth your time if you like science fiction.

I just finished his book of short stories A Place So Foreign and 8 More. You can read seven of the nine stories online, and they too are very much worth your time.

The stories in the book do a good job of making the reader think about what's happening. Most of the time you are thrown, flailing, into an unfamiliar world and left to find your bearings quickly.
Often it would take until after I had finished a story for everything to gel in my head (though that could be due to my reading the stories largely in the break room at work).

The titular story is about a boy from New Jerusalem, Utah, in 1898 who finds out that his father is the ambassador to 1975 which they travel to through a hidden door in their barn. It's a sci-fi Tom Sawyer.

Three of the stories in the book take place in the same universe where an alien race, the Bugouts, have come to Earth and taken over. One, "Shadow of the Mothaship" tells the story of a man who is in constant rebellion against his father and the bugouts. "Home Again, Home Again," tells of a man who was raised inside a Bugout insane asylum. Finally "The Super Man and the Bugouts" presents a story of a very Jewish Super-Man and his dealings with humanity and the aliens.

Another story Beat Me Daddy (Eight to the Bar) is available online at Fortean Bureau. A post-apocalyptic story of survival over idiocy.

Go check them out and buy Cory's books.

The Simple Rich Girls Life

I had the pleasure of being subjected to my first viewing of an episode of Paris Hilton and Lionel Richie's Daughter's wonderful fish-out-of-water show "The Simple Life" while in Athens, as well as some of MTV's "Rich Girls."

Ahhh Television.

I think I am a bit offended by the way that SL manages to make fun of the Arkasas family and town that are in the show. Look at the bumpkins, ain't they so silly. There is a bit of the same backhandedness towards the stars as in the Anna Nicole Smith Show, but not as much. Whereas Anna is pretty stupid and everyone in the show except her is in on the fact that that's what the show is about, SL is about the girls knowing that they will try to spin it that way and trying their damndest to make themselves look like the fun-loving party girls.

The reason the show doesn't really work for me is that there is no consequences to anything that the two do. During the show they jerked off on the job at Sonic, doing things that would have gotten pretty much anyone else fired. They were kept on because of the cameras. I also liked the fact that the show seemed to want to portray Sonic as something that only exists in the rural south, when I know for a fact that there are sonic's at least as far north as Kentucky and as far west as Texas.

So what did they get for wandering off the job, writing juvenile things on the sign out front, and being "aren't we so cool, look how we can make fun of the yocals without them realizing it" asses? They get a paycheck at the end of the day and a talking to from the family patriarch that they're staying with.

Maybe if there were consequences to their actions; say the father or their bosses at work had the ability to take money away from the no-doubt big payday they'll get for the show. For instance, say they decide not to do any chores around the house one day, well that's $10K off each off what they make, do it again and it's $20K. In the end they could end up owing money to the family (Not that that would be a big thing to Hilton), that might be a better show.

Which brings us to Rich Girls.

Actually I don't think it does. I'm not even going to waste more space talking about that show, we'll just leave it at that.

I wonder if Charmed is on?

City Hunters

This story was on the front page of my local paper when I was in Athens:

Calhoun Can't Stop City Hunters


It brings to mind visions of men dressed in camouflage and bright orange hats and vests taking coverbehindd the Hardees and shooting at wandering deer and ducks. Lots of these guys, coming in from out of town and deciding that the city of Calhoun is the perfect place to go a huntin'.

I find it interesting that there is so much of a problem of people hunting in the city of Calhoun that they have to try and enact legislation to stop it.

I also find it interesting that it isapparentlyy legal for people to hunt inside the city limits as long as they aren't being too reckless about it.

Just becarefull where you're pointing your gun and make sure that you have an up-to-date hunting license.

The Democrat Civil War

I caught as much of the G. Gordon Liddy show on the way in today as I could stand, and one of the large topics of discussion that he and his listeners were positively orgasmic over was the idea that the Democrats are going through a schism of sorts. On the one side you've got the Dean/Gore camp that are, at least on the surface, liberal democrats, and on the other you have the Lieberman/Clinton (to some degree Clark) camp, that are more centrist, almost masquerading republicans.

Of course there were lots of good ol' Clinton and Hillary bashing moments thrown in, but that was the general gist of the show.

I'm in favor of this just as much as Gordon is, but for different reasons. I don't think that this means the end of the Democratic party so much as an opportunity for change in our outmoded one-party pretending to be a two-party system.

It's time for the democrats to split.

I think a new party made up of the so-called liberal democrats would be a good thing for the country. I don't think that it would so much divide the current base of voters for the democrats, but would pull even more voters from the republicans as many of the more left leaning of the reps would flow over into the centrist Lieberman camp and the ones that the GOP desperately wants to paint as the loonies would be allowed to be liberal.

What is Dean trying to hide? He is trying to seal his records as governor of Vermont for ten years. What's going on there? Is whatever he's wanting suppressed the reason that the Republicans are so jonesed to have him as the frontrunner? Is it something that they can exploit, but don't want to let out until the eventual election so they can crush him? Do they not want to put it out there so that they can use it and not the other democratic candidates?

Does it even matter in the end? We all know that if he becomes the Democratic candidate, Rove and his crew will smear the hell out of him and it won't matter what the truth is.

One in Ten Million

I am from a long line of men on both sides of my family who pretty much refuse to go to the doctor. Arm falling off, it's fine I'll walk it off. Coughing up ugly mucous monsters, fine.

Most of the time it is only on occasions where someone forces me to go that I will. I don't know if that's just a southern male thing or what, but it's the same for pretty much all the men in my family, regardless of any other peculiarities of character.

So it took my mother making me an appointment to see my optometrist this weekend for me to actually go and get some new glasses (which I have been needing for about three years, as it was getting to the point where it was harder to see through the scratches and whatnot than to just puzzle it out without them).

So I go with the expectation of just getting fitted with a new prescription and that's that.

But noooo.

After the first doctor spends quite some time looking over my eyes, specifically my gimpy left one, he talks at me a bit and then tells me he wants to go get the other doctor to come and look at my eye. So I sit and wait for a few more minutes (20 or so) until the other doctor is free and then he gets out optics and looks as well. Then there is some conference and he says "I wish I could see this on my scope."

At this point they're making me a bit nervous don't you know.

Some background on my gimpy eye. When I was very young I had some form of fever blister on my eye that did left a scar on my cornea and my retina that makes my vision not so good out of that eye. I can see movement and detail and whatnot, but it's pretty blurry and my better eye picks up most of the slack. It's been like that for most of my life, and it doesn't bother me so much.

Anyway, back to the two doctors and the various nurses clucking about my eye.

This ends up with the first doctor telling me that I've got some blood vessel growth on my eye that's growing down over my cornea and could lead to--dum-dum-dum--Glaucoma.

Then gives me the warning symptoms of a retinal detachment, telling me that it is a fairly remote possibility, but something that I should be aware of.

"If you ever see bright lightning bolts over your field of vision and lots of big floaters and your vision starts getting dimmer and fading out, get to a doctor immediately. Every second is more of your vision that you save."

That's some scary stuff right there.

Also he talked a little bit about a corneal transplant being the only real thing that could fix the problem.

Then he set up an appointment to see the specialist the next day so that she could give an opinion on my case.

Needless to say that with the already stressful week this was freaking me out more than a little bit.

The next day I go in to see the specialist, and luckily she's quite a bit more reassuring than the previous day's visit. The chances of me going blind in my left eye are pretty remote, and the new growth doesn't look very bad, but it is something that should be watched. She did say that my eye's condition is one in ten million. Perhaps she was exagerating, but I like that, at the very least, I am one of maybe 200 people in America that have this type of gimpy eye.

Immediately my visions of corneal detachment and eventual eye-patch and monocle wearing started evaporating.

So now I have an appointment with a corneal specialist here in Nashville. Yet another doctor to see.

All because I wanted some new glasses.

Out of the Loop

My Grandfather died last week and I've been out of town for his funeral. My mother's computer seems to have something against blogger so I haven't updated while there.

It was only a short time ago that my grandmother died, and it is a sad thing to know that neither of them will be there anymore. My mother pointed out a spot under a tree at my grandparents house where I used to play and was known to eat mud (in my defense it was more than two years ago).

When we were going through their now strangely quiet house I saw lots of things that I hadn't thought about in years, like the furniture and things in the rear bedrooms of the house where I spent many nights when visiting them.

It's funny when you think about people who are gone the things that come into your head. When they were asking me if there was anything in the house that I wanted to take with me the only thing that I was fixated on was a lamp in the living room that is made from an old hand-waterpump. For some reason that is the one item that I identify most with their house and them. It's in my room here now, and it makes me both sad and nostalgic to look at it.

Be a Man

Chuck D spoke at MTSU recently, and I read in the campus newspaper that he said something along the lines of "The current state of rap is sorry. Kids are sitting at home listening to this stuff and thinking, I can do this, and they're right."

Macho Man Randy Savage's Be a Man is the album that proves Chuck right.

Anyone can make a rap album. Anyone.

Take one out of work wrestler with a reasonable amount of celebrity, mix with semi-talented writers and producers, stir in a song challenging another 80s wrestler and one in honor of a dead one, and shake. Out pops this album.

This is quite possibly the most craptacular thing ever produced by man. Never before have the worlds of rap and wrestling been merged into a seamless whole such as this.

There were glimmers of such a thing in Hulk Hogan's 1995 Hulk Rules album, where the Hulkster laid down some fresh rhymes, and NWA-TNA wrestler Ron "tha Truth" Killings is a rapper who has put out a few albums, but nothing in comparison to this.

Nothing.

I think they missed out on something by not cursing more. Just the new horizons for rhyming words ending in "-it" would have added alot to the songs, rather than relying on "That's the slogan" being used more than once.

After listening to this album the 14 times that is legally required for writing a review I have a few questions for Randy. In one song he talks about how he won't cheat on his lady because she's stuck by him, but in another he talks about how they're wanting to have some fun with ladies at the club. Which is it Macho?

Of course he didn't actually write any of the lyrics.

Macho Man is credited as a co-writer on only one track, the titular "Be a Man," where the chorus chants:

"Be a man Hulk,
Come on don't be scurred,
You're runnin from Macho
That's what I heard."

The rest of the album is credited to K. Keene and a few others. Either Keene isn't a very good lyricist, or he's saving his better rhymes for himself or somebody that might be a bit higher profile, but the rhymes here are some slaw.

You'd almost start thinking that I don't like it, wouldn't you?

Not hardly.

This is the greatest album ever produced. Ever.

The RIAA is worrying that file sharing will kill the record industry, that's bull. This will kill it. After hearing this album everyone will be so crestfallen by it's brilliance that they will not be able to continue on. In the future there will only be a succession of Macho Man albums, all rappers and producers will only be able to hope to one day work for him.

All hail Macho.

'Cause Randy don't play. Oh Yeah!

Playing Undead

Playing Undead a good article from 1995 by Douglas Rushkoff on live action role-playing in San Fransisco.

Permanent Damage

Stephen Grant's Permanent Damage column over at CBR is a good read if you like commentary and criticism on the comic industry and television/movies as well as a bit of political observation thrown in there as well.

This week he talks about Bush's (or the Hand Puppet as he calls him) trip to feed thanksgiving dinner to some troops in Iraq and likens it to Lyndon Johnson's trip to Vietnam in 1966. Neither of them were for campaign purposes, right?

Also he covers the swiping of artwork that is done by many artists in the comic industry and compares it to plagerism in writing. Swiping refers to the using of another artists layout and style for a page or panel. It was very prevalent in the older Bullpen days of comics, and continues through today. It even happens that you'll see someone steal their own layout like Jim Lee did in an issue of Wildcats where he used the exact layout of one of his x-men pages. It boils down to much the same idea of master studies done in art school where you copy an artists works to find out how the produced an image, the only difference is that if you try to sell a master work you may be arrested for forgery.

Jangle bells makes them crazy

An Austrian trade union has claimed the repetitive playing of Christmas Carols in department stores is nothing short of "psycho-terrorism" for salespeople.

From morning to night, for weeks before Christmas, there was the same Christmas music in department stores over and over again, said Gottfried Rieser of the Union of Private Employees.

"Many staff in the retail sector suffer psychologically from it. They get aggressions and aversions against Christmas music. On Christmas Eve with their families, they can't stand Silent Night or Jingle Bells any more," he said.


Yes, we all know it's Christmas time, but the stores don't need to beat it into your heads. I think it becomes apparant if you are in stores that play an excess of Christmas tunes that there are only so many versions of songs out there.

It'll be nice when January rolls around for just this reason.

Lost in Translation

Here's a translation of the red-riding hood japanese video from a few posts back:

"This is Anabuki Construction Company's Campaign Girl, Anabukin-chan! She tries to be good just like any good girl, this Anabukin-chan!"

Anabukinchan, [go for it]!
Okay!
Expanding dreams,
Service mansion!
Expanding hopes,
Service mansion!
Expanding chests,
Expanding, expanding,
Wow!
Service mansion!

"Good service!"

Actually it is reasonably similar to Gunny's translation.

Now you know, and knowing is half the battle.

Found via Boing-Boing.