Yes, I just did this meme. Sort of. I actually posted it here with the intention of being asked, because it was a fun meme to play and I thought it'd be a good way to introduce myself and mwahahahaha my plan worked!!!
(It was also fun to get to know the new people on my list, so that worked out quite well, too.)
For the record: I don't know if this matters to any of you, but I'm going to be lazy and copy some of these answers from older posts.
Comment on this post. I will choose seven interests from your profile and you will explain what they mean and why you are interested in them. Post this along with your answers in your own journal so others can play along.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
mochi asked me about:
1. bunzleberry pie
Remember the movie Toy Story? Well, Disney made a cartoon spin-off series, as Disney is wont to do. It was called Buzz Lightyear of Star Command, and it was all about Buzz's adventures as a Space Ranger, foiling the plots of Evil Emperor Zurg. Of course, they had to expand the cast, so Buzz works with a mixed group of rookie rangers with various abilities. One of them, Booster, is a giant lovable super-strong egg-shaped red alien who left his peaceful little farm to pursue his dream of being a Space Ranger. Booster's favorite food (so good it's completely irresistible) is... bunzleberry pie. (Preferably homemade, by his mother, from fresh bunzleberries, which grow on bushes near the farm.)
I liked the show. Booster's a big goof. And bunzleberry pie just sounds like something I'd like to try, one of these days. And I like having silly, obscure things in my interests list.
2. exosquad
Exosquad was a cartoon back in the 90s. Anime concepts, but American art and writing. Which is perfect for me, since the hyper-stylization of actual anime isn't always to my tastes. I do like some of the ideas of it, though. And the way storylines develop from one ep to the next.
It was a cool show all around. Took place in the future. Humans had created "neo-sapiens," a species of humanoids grown in labs and genetically engineered to be slaves. They rebelled. There was a war. It ended in an uneasy truce, with humans living on Earth and neo-sapiens living on Mars. The series picks up a few decades later. Come to think, it's kind of surprising how similar the concept sounds to new BSG, which it predated by a decade. Anyway, our heroes are a small squad of cops, more or less, who patrol with "exosuits" (small battle mechs). There's the expected mix. The Leader, the Nerd, the One Guy From The Enemy Race Who Is On Our Side, etc.
The series was well-written, with many aspects. There was the space-based sci-fi action. There was some comedy. There was subtle, complex, and interesting philosophy (mostly moral). And there was kind of a soap opera aspect, with a stream of subplots having to do with personal drama (and character growth).
Unfortunately, the series was canceled halfway through season 2. It was a decent ending point, plot-wise, at least. Nothing left unresolved. The show's executive producer, Will Meugniot, at the time hung out on the Compuserve message boards, and would actually sometimes respond to email. He told me that the plan was to transition the series. If the series had continued after the midseason break, he'd have brought in the Macross aliens. I've never seen that show, but I'm told it would have been a pretty cool crossover. I'm not entirely sure how I feel about the idea.
Still, I loved the show. It had a lot going for it. I stuck it in my interests for old time's sake. And in case one of the small group of fans it managed to pick up happened to be on DW and feel like reminiscing or something.
3. flying toasters
It's was an old screensaver for Macs. (Hey look, it's got its own Wiki page!) It came in a package from After Dark (not as kinky as it sounds!), and was the default. Winged toasters would go diagonally across the screen, chasing slices of toast. I don't know what it was about it, really, but somehow it just seemed fun and whimsical. It was on all the comps in the school computer lab (I never owned a Mac myself, though I did grow up with an Apple IIc). It made me smile. So I stuck it on the interests list. (And hey! There's supposedly an XP version now! Might just have to install that....)
4. invisible smurfs
Freshman year in college, I was on a philosophical discussion mailing list. Had a lot of fun. One of the first conversations I was part of, back before first semester even started, was about agnosticism. My stated position, in short, was that a Creator, by definition, exists outside of reality as we know it, and that therefore there was no reliable means to prove or disprove His existence. Someone countered with an argument that you could say the same about invisible smurfs. You can't reliably disprove their existence, either. So I must, by the same logic, be willing to accept belief in them. I responded by disproving the existence of invisible smurfs. (First by pointing out that smurfs are blue, and you can't be invisible and blue at the same time. But immediately followed by a longer argument involving biochemistry.)
Immediately after sending, I found myself gripped by a certain surreal feeling. In a daze, I got up, walked down the hall to the nearest open door, and told my neighbor (whom I'd only just met), "... I just disproved the existence of invisible smurfs." Without batting an eye, he responded, "Aww. I kinda liked the little guys." And that was when I knew I was home.
5. ninjas with nametags
This is a little something I thought up that amused me. I decided it would make a fun random little thing to put on the interests lists. Basically, it's like this... Ninjas are supposed to be deadly assassins. People who have trained their whole lives with that very purpose in mind. And yet, they always fail. The good guy kicks their butts by the dozen, even if he's only trained for a couple of years (or less!). Why? Because he's a named character, and they're faceless cannon fodder.
You see it in the movies. You see it in the comic books. You see it in video games.
Elektra, a comic book character originally from DareDevil, was a girl who did martial arts training as a hobby. Her father died, she put on a costume, and... *poof* she could take on a room full of ninja assassins. In an ironic twist, she ended up becoming the leader of The Hand, the deadliest group of ninjas in the Marvel Universe. (The good guys can still kick their butts by the dozen, but they actually get hurt doing it.)
Ninjas have the training, the skills, and the reputation. And if they're allowed to work off-screen or off-panel, or at least in an area without a named character, they can be very effective. Now, a single, named ninja like Elektra can be a threat. A team with identifiable members (like the Ninja Turtles) can be very effective. The only thing stopping the mobs from being what they should be is that they come in faceless, nameless mobs.
Solution? Give them nametags. A generic ninja, dressed head to toe in black, is nothing. One hit, and he's out of the fight. Give him a name, and suddenly he's able to trade punches on equal footing. A whole mob of deadly shadow warriors, each with his (or her) own nametag hanging off the stealth suit, would be unstoppable. (And kind of funny to look at. In a deadly and intimidating way.)
6. penguin conspiracy theories
First, it must be understood that penguins are one of only two animals on Earth which are inherently amusing. (The other, of course, is the platypus.) There are dog people and cat people and people who appreciate neither. There are cute little baby animals which rapidly grow up to be, on the whole, far less cute. But penguins and platypi just make people smile. Even grown-ups. Even just walking along.
But...
Thanks to the international Antarctic treaty, penguins legally own the entire continent. Okay, it doesn't specify penguins. But it does specify that humans can't lay claim to ownership of any part of the continent. And the penguins are the most prominent native species. So, basically, they own the whole thing. And, furthermore, the law specifies that humans aren't allowed to bring weapons there. And it specifically bans killing, wounding, or capturing them. But the penguins aren't satisfied with that. They have kings and emperors. And, without most people even noticing, they've colonized the beaches of the Southern Hemisphere all the way up to the tropics. And they're very territorial. And, thanks to that amusement factor, they've come to inhabit many of the major cities of the Northern Hemisphere. Really, when you get down to it, it becomes frighteningly clear.
The penguins are taking over the world.
7. the word "spelunking"
It amuses me. It's got a nice ring to it. It just sounds fun. Was introduced to me by one of the Carmen Sandiego games, no doubt put in there by someone else who felt it was a fun word.
The actual definition refers to the hobby/practice of cave exploration. I haven't done anything more adventurous than an hour-long guided group tour, but that was fun.
My teenage self, however, liked the word even more. Hormones liked the sound of exploring deep inside dank, dark caves, just for the adventurous fun of it.
flourish asked me about:
1. big guy and rusty
Much like The Tick, in a way. Both were Saturday morning cartoons. Both were genre parodies. Both turned out to have originally been comic books series. Both turned out to have far surpassed the original source material. Both were canclled after two seasons.
Big Guy and Rusty the Boy Robot was a retro sci fi show. Two robots - one big, one a child - fighting monsters and aliens and stuff. All looking fresh off the cover of a 50's sci fi magazine. Except that, known only to a chosen few, the famous and popular BGY-11 (aka Big Guy) was a failure. They'd never gotten his AI to work. So his "chief mechanic" is actually his pilot. Rusty, who looks and thinks like a child, is actually the world's first robot with a working AI. (It's that childish nature which made it work, allowing his mind to grow and evolve on its own rather than trying to program the entire thing from the start.) But he's too "young" to be trusted with Big Guy's secret. In fact, Big Guy is his hero. (And he's only too honored to have earned a place as Big Guy's sidekick.)
It's a series with a twinkle in its eye and a sense of childlike wonder. It was a Saturday morning adventure. A show about a superhero with a secret identity. A show about a unique, enthusiastic, and very naive child. And, at the same time, a parody of all those things.
2. folcs
Fans of Lois and Clark. L&C:TNAOS was... a pretty good show. But it attracted a very cool set of fans. Through them, I was introduced to fanfic. And fandom in general. Really, it's the only fandom I've truly been a part of, and I was a part of it (to varying degrees) for over a decade. Maybe even half my life. Most of my closest friends today are people I met through FoLCdom. It's a quiet little fandom, as fandoms go. And it's attracted a disproportionate number of quality fic writers.
I finally drifted out last year. I'd stopped reading the fic. Stopped writing it. Most of my friends had moved on to other things. And I realized I didn't really belong anymore. But it's still special to me.
3. making fun of plato
Plato is so overhyped. Socrates was brilliant. Able to look at the world square on and see how much we don't know, don't understand, and just blithely assume we get. Justice, for example. Everyone talks about it like they know what it is, but Socrates stopped to think about it, and in the space of a half page conversation (written, it's assumed, by Plato), demonstrates how impossible it is to actually pin down a true definition of the concept. Reading Socrates leaves you feeling like an ignorant fool, but, at the same time, it leaves you feeling enlightened. You realize how much you don't know, but you're better off for that realization. Better off for having taken the time to question your assumptions. And, when you get down to it, you're in impeccable company in your enlightened ignorance.
And then there's Plato. His writings use the voice of Socrates, but it's all drastically changed. The old writings are an homage to his master. The new ones use him as a mouthpiece. False modesty? Building on the established name? Some of both? There's no good alternative. Especially since the writings go from questioning everything and pointing out ignorance to building up fantasies. Granted, there's only so much you can do by tearing things down. At some point, you need to build. But what Plato built is deeply flawed. His concept of Forms makes little sense and has gaping logical holes. And it's all built out of thin air. It's the antithesis of the Socratic Method. And his Republic? His idea for the perfect government? It's an enforced caste system run by... what else? Philosophers. People like, say, Plato. All of it built on a lie. A deliberately fabricated mythology designed to get the ignorant masses to accept their lot in life. It's disgusting. Socrates would have been mortified. And the fact that it's all written as if it were coming out of his mouth makes it even more perverted.
Plato somehow managed to teach Aristotle, who was more naturalist/scientist than philosopher. (It's a shame Aristotle's lectures were never recorded. His personal notes are... just that. Notes jotted for personal use. Very dense and often hard to follow by themselves. It's said he was a skilled lecturer. But all we have are the rough equivalent of Powerpoint slides.)
"You're that smart?"
"Let me put it this way... you ever hear of Socrates? Plato? Aristotle?"
"Yes..."
"Morons."
-Vizzini and The Dread Pirate Roberts, The Princess Bride (aka The Greatest Movie Ever)
Clearly, he wasn't that smart, after all. But he got one out of three right.
So, in sum... I don't actually make fun of Plato, per se (except when it comes to puns involving a certain clay-like squishable child's toy, but those are pretty rare). It's more that I think he's deserving of it.
4. real genius
Real Genius is a nerd movie. One of Val Kilmer's earliest film roles. Takes place at a magnet school. It's wacky, zany, and fun. It is awesome.
The only thing wrong with the movie is that it gave me unrealistic expectations for life at MIT.
5. sledgeomatic
There was a stand-up comic who was popular in the 70s and 80s by the name of Gallagher. (Sadly, his little brother ended up trying to cash in on the name by taking over the stage act and billing himself as "The Living Sequel.") Gallagher was funny. He was insightful. He had a great bit about English language spelling, for example. (That clip, as you can probably tell, is actually a mashup of a couple different bits.) You may have heard some of his one-liners. I saw a whole email once filled with them. Completely uncredited, of course. Stuff like, "Why do we drive on a parkway and park on a driveway?" Which is amusing by itself, but really gets you going as part of a whole list of 'em. And he had real one-liners like, "Remember: behind every successful man is an amazed mother-in-law."
But, though he did a number of different shows with a number of different themes, each one would end with his signature bit: The sledge-o-matic. It was an infomercial for the latest and greatest kitchen gadget. Not a slicer. Not a dicer. Not a chopper and a hopper. So what in the heck could it possibly be? Sledge-o-matic! And he'd take out a big old wooden sledgehammer and happily smash stuff to bits while explaining all the nifty features. It was messy and silly, but he managed to make it new and funny every time. And clever. Sure, it always ended with a watermellon going *splat* all over the stage (and the first three rows of the audience - who had been provided with protective clear plastic sheeting). But every once in a while, he'd surprise you. Come up with new angles, new tricks. Like once, in the middle of the bit, going through at full steam, he pulled out a light bulb. "Sledge-o-matic flattens light bulbs for easy storage!" And he did the backswing. Prepared to hit it. Faked the audience out. And then, just as they were sure it wasn't going to happen, he did it. And... it was a prop light bulb which actually smushed neatly and quietly flat without a single crack.
Really, it's hard to do it justice. You can see an early performance here, but it lacks the polish and full originality of his later work. Still, it's something. (And it's the genuine article.)
6.the confessor
Astro City is the awesomest comic book ever.
Watchmen, written during the Grim and Gritty 80s, ripped apart the superhero, kicking off the Deconstruction. It highlighted everything wrong and silly about the idea of a superhero. It showed us exactly what kind of screwed-up individuals these people must be, and asked us if, really, when you think about it, you'd trust them with your safety. It caught the cape flying by, tore it off, threw it in the mud, and stomped on it good and proper.
That is not what I want from escapist fantasy entertainment.
Astro City was created by Kurt Busiek, a brilliant comics writer who is also not fond of the Deconstruction. (Not that Alan Moore isn't brilliant, mind you. It's just that I don't like Watchmen or the movement that followed. But Moore's run on Supreme rocked - you can read it for free over on WOWIO if you want - and Top Ten is amazing.) Busiek asked a very important question. "What's the point of a Deconstruction if you don't put things back together, newer and better, afterwards?" With Astro City, he began the Reconstruction. It's carefully, lovingly crafted. Character-driven stories, gorgeous art, and a whole jaw-dropping world populated with a full variety of iconic heroes, each with his own unique origin and backstory. Most (though not all) of them are built on recognizable archetypes, but each is fully developed in his/her/its own right.
It was written back in the days before everything was done with an eye towards the inevitable TPB. The first few issues were all single-issue stories, though each added to the mythology of the whole.
The first real story arc was Confession. It's told from the point of view of a kid who leaves his rural life to pursue his dreams in the big city, but it's more about the hero who helps him fulfill those dreams. That hero is, on one level, very clearly Not Batman. He dresses in black from head to toe, lurks in dark alleys, intimidates thugs, busts up street crime, and is a brilliant and methodical detective. But the swirling black cloth is not a cape, and the bright symbol on his chest isn't a bat. The Confessor is a priest. And he has a secret.
More than that, I won't say, but... It's Astro City at its best.
7. cottage cheese w/maple syrup
What can I say? I love it. It is, IMHO, the only way to eat cottage cheese. But I can hardly get anyone else to even try it. I guess it's uniquely mine. So I have it in my interests. Both because it is uniquely mine and because I still hold out the faint hope that someone else out there will give it a shot and discover its deliciousness. Or that maybe, just maybe, there's someone else out there who has discovered it already.
Of course, it should be noted that I don't use real maple syrup for this. For one thing, I don't like the grainy texture of it. Or, for that matter, the strong flavor of pure maple. More importantly, however, I'm diabetic. So the stuff I smother my cottage cheese under is actually artificially flavored sugar-free maple syrup. But, I tell you, it works wonders on cottage cheese.
And... I spent my free time today writing all that up. So I guess I'll test the cross-poster tomorrow. But I hope you enjoyed this. :)
One more thing... Since I just posted this meme last entry, I'll ask again that if you want to play, please indicate that in your comment.
(It was also fun to get to know the new people on my list, so that worked out quite well, too.)
For the record: I don't know if this matters to any of you, but I'm going to be lazy and copy some of these answers from older posts.
Comment on this post. I will choose seven interests from your profile and you will explain what they mean and why you are interested in them. Post this along with your answers in your own journal so others can play along.
mochi asked me about:1. bunzleberry pie
Remember the movie Toy Story? Well, Disney made a cartoon spin-off series, as Disney is wont to do. It was called Buzz Lightyear of Star Command, and it was all about Buzz's adventures as a Space Ranger, foiling the plots of Evil Emperor Zurg. Of course, they had to expand the cast, so Buzz works with a mixed group of rookie rangers with various abilities. One of them, Booster, is a giant lovable super-strong egg-shaped red alien who left his peaceful little farm to pursue his dream of being a Space Ranger. Booster's favorite food (so good it's completely irresistible) is... bunzleberry pie. (Preferably homemade, by his mother, from fresh bunzleberries, which grow on bushes near the farm.)
I liked the show. Booster's a big goof. And bunzleberry pie just sounds like something I'd like to try, one of these days. And I like having silly, obscure things in my interests list.
2. exosquad
Exosquad was a cartoon back in the 90s. Anime concepts, but American art and writing. Which is perfect for me, since the hyper-stylization of actual anime isn't always to my tastes. I do like some of the ideas of it, though. And the way storylines develop from one ep to the next.
It was a cool show all around. Took place in the future. Humans had created "neo-sapiens," a species of humanoids grown in labs and genetically engineered to be slaves. They rebelled. There was a war. It ended in an uneasy truce, with humans living on Earth and neo-sapiens living on Mars. The series picks up a few decades later. Come to think, it's kind of surprising how similar the concept sounds to new BSG, which it predated by a decade. Anyway, our heroes are a small squad of cops, more or less, who patrol with "exosuits" (small battle mechs). There's the expected mix. The Leader, the Nerd, the One Guy From The Enemy Race Who Is On Our Side, etc.
The series was well-written, with many aspects. There was the space-based sci-fi action. There was some comedy. There was subtle, complex, and interesting philosophy (mostly moral). And there was kind of a soap opera aspect, with a stream of subplots having to do with personal drama (and character growth).
Unfortunately, the series was canceled halfway through season 2. It was a decent ending point, plot-wise, at least. Nothing left unresolved. The show's executive producer, Will Meugniot, at the time hung out on the Compuserve message boards, and would actually sometimes respond to email. He told me that the plan was to transition the series. If the series had continued after the midseason break, he'd have brought in the Macross aliens. I've never seen that show, but I'm told it would have been a pretty cool crossover. I'm not entirely sure how I feel about the idea.
Still, I loved the show. It had a lot going for it. I stuck it in my interests for old time's sake. And in case one of the small group of fans it managed to pick up happened to be on DW and feel like reminiscing or something.
3. flying toasters
It's was an old screensaver for Macs. (Hey look, it's got its own Wiki page!) It came in a package from After Dark (not as kinky as it sounds!), and was the default. Winged toasters would go diagonally across the screen, chasing slices of toast. I don't know what it was about it, really, but somehow it just seemed fun and whimsical. It was on all the comps in the school computer lab (I never owned a Mac myself, though I did grow up with an Apple IIc). It made me smile. So I stuck it on the interests list. (And hey! There's supposedly an XP version now! Might just have to install that....)
4. invisible smurfs
Freshman year in college, I was on a philosophical discussion mailing list. Had a lot of fun. One of the first conversations I was part of, back before first semester even started, was about agnosticism. My stated position, in short, was that a Creator, by definition, exists outside of reality as we know it, and that therefore there was no reliable means to prove or disprove His existence. Someone countered with an argument that you could say the same about invisible smurfs. You can't reliably disprove their existence, either. So I must, by the same logic, be willing to accept belief in them. I responded by disproving the existence of invisible smurfs. (First by pointing out that smurfs are blue, and you can't be invisible and blue at the same time. But immediately followed by a longer argument involving biochemistry.)
Immediately after sending, I found myself gripped by a certain surreal feeling. In a daze, I got up, walked down the hall to the nearest open door, and told my neighbor (whom I'd only just met), "... I just disproved the existence of invisible smurfs." Without batting an eye, he responded, "Aww. I kinda liked the little guys." And that was when I knew I was home.
5. ninjas with nametags
This is a little something I thought up that amused me. I decided it would make a fun random little thing to put on the interests lists. Basically, it's like this... Ninjas are supposed to be deadly assassins. People who have trained their whole lives with that very purpose in mind. And yet, they always fail. The good guy kicks their butts by the dozen, even if he's only trained for a couple of years (or less!). Why? Because he's a named character, and they're faceless cannon fodder.
You see it in the movies. You see it in the comic books. You see it in video games.
Elektra, a comic book character originally from DareDevil, was a girl who did martial arts training as a hobby. Her father died, she put on a costume, and... *poof* she could take on a room full of ninja assassins. In an ironic twist, she ended up becoming the leader of The Hand, the deadliest group of ninjas in the Marvel Universe. (The good guys can still kick their butts by the dozen, but they actually get hurt doing it.)
Ninjas have the training, the skills, and the reputation. And if they're allowed to work off-screen or off-panel, or at least in an area without a named character, they can be very effective. Now, a single, named ninja like Elektra can be a threat. A team with identifiable members (like the Ninja Turtles) can be very effective. The only thing stopping the mobs from being what they should be is that they come in faceless, nameless mobs.
Solution? Give them nametags. A generic ninja, dressed head to toe in black, is nothing. One hit, and he's out of the fight. Give him a name, and suddenly he's able to trade punches on equal footing. A whole mob of deadly shadow warriors, each with his (or her) own nametag hanging off the stealth suit, would be unstoppable. (And kind of funny to look at. In a deadly and intimidating way.)
6. penguin conspiracy theories
First, it must be understood that penguins are one of only two animals on Earth which are inherently amusing. (The other, of course, is the platypus.) There are dog people and cat people and people who appreciate neither. There are cute little baby animals which rapidly grow up to be, on the whole, far less cute. But penguins and platypi just make people smile. Even grown-ups. Even just walking along.
But...
Thanks to the international Antarctic treaty, penguins legally own the entire continent. Okay, it doesn't specify penguins. But it does specify that humans can't lay claim to ownership of any part of the continent. And the penguins are the most prominent native species. So, basically, they own the whole thing. And, furthermore, the law specifies that humans aren't allowed to bring weapons there. And it specifically bans killing, wounding, or capturing them. But the penguins aren't satisfied with that. They have kings and emperors. And, without most people even noticing, they've colonized the beaches of the Southern Hemisphere all the way up to the tropics. And they're very territorial. And, thanks to that amusement factor, they've come to inhabit many of the major cities of the Northern Hemisphere. Really, when you get down to it, it becomes frighteningly clear.
The penguins are taking over the world.
7. the word "spelunking"
It amuses me. It's got a nice ring to it. It just sounds fun. Was introduced to me by one of the Carmen Sandiego games, no doubt put in there by someone else who felt it was a fun word.
The actual definition refers to the hobby/practice of cave exploration. I haven't done anything more adventurous than an hour-long guided group tour, but that was fun.
My teenage self, however, liked the word even more. Hormones liked the sound of exploring deep inside dank, dark caves, just for the adventurous fun of it.
flourish asked me about:1. big guy and rusty
Much like The Tick, in a way. Both were Saturday morning cartoons. Both were genre parodies. Both turned out to have originally been comic books series. Both turned out to have far surpassed the original source material. Both were canclled after two seasons.
Big Guy and Rusty the Boy Robot was a retro sci fi show. Two robots - one big, one a child - fighting monsters and aliens and stuff. All looking fresh off the cover of a 50's sci fi magazine. Except that, known only to a chosen few, the famous and popular BGY-11 (aka Big Guy) was a failure. They'd never gotten his AI to work. So his "chief mechanic" is actually his pilot. Rusty, who looks and thinks like a child, is actually the world's first robot with a working AI. (It's that childish nature which made it work, allowing his mind to grow and evolve on its own rather than trying to program the entire thing from the start.) But he's too "young" to be trusted with Big Guy's secret. In fact, Big Guy is his hero. (And he's only too honored to have earned a place as Big Guy's sidekick.)
It's a series with a twinkle in its eye and a sense of childlike wonder. It was a Saturday morning adventure. A show about a superhero with a secret identity. A show about a unique, enthusiastic, and very naive child. And, at the same time, a parody of all those things.
2. folcs
Fans of Lois and Clark. L&C:TNAOS was... a pretty good show. But it attracted a very cool set of fans. Through them, I was introduced to fanfic. And fandom in general. Really, it's the only fandom I've truly been a part of, and I was a part of it (to varying degrees) for over a decade. Maybe even half my life. Most of my closest friends today are people I met through FoLCdom. It's a quiet little fandom, as fandoms go. And it's attracted a disproportionate number of quality fic writers.
I finally drifted out last year. I'd stopped reading the fic. Stopped writing it. Most of my friends had moved on to other things. And I realized I didn't really belong anymore. But it's still special to me.
3. making fun of plato
Plato is so overhyped. Socrates was brilliant. Able to look at the world square on and see how much we don't know, don't understand, and just blithely assume we get. Justice, for example. Everyone talks about it like they know what it is, but Socrates stopped to think about it, and in the space of a half page conversation (written, it's assumed, by Plato), demonstrates how impossible it is to actually pin down a true definition of the concept. Reading Socrates leaves you feeling like an ignorant fool, but, at the same time, it leaves you feeling enlightened. You realize how much you don't know, but you're better off for that realization. Better off for having taken the time to question your assumptions. And, when you get down to it, you're in impeccable company in your enlightened ignorance.
And then there's Plato. His writings use the voice of Socrates, but it's all drastically changed. The old writings are an homage to his master. The new ones use him as a mouthpiece. False modesty? Building on the established name? Some of both? There's no good alternative. Especially since the writings go from questioning everything and pointing out ignorance to building up fantasies. Granted, there's only so much you can do by tearing things down. At some point, you need to build. But what Plato built is deeply flawed. His concept of Forms makes little sense and has gaping logical holes. And it's all built out of thin air. It's the antithesis of the Socratic Method. And his Republic? His idea for the perfect government? It's an enforced caste system run by... what else? Philosophers. People like, say, Plato. All of it built on a lie. A deliberately fabricated mythology designed to get the ignorant masses to accept their lot in life. It's disgusting. Socrates would have been mortified. And the fact that it's all written as if it were coming out of his mouth makes it even more perverted.
Plato somehow managed to teach Aristotle, who was more naturalist/scientist than philosopher. (It's a shame Aristotle's lectures were never recorded. His personal notes are... just that. Notes jotted for personal use. Very dense and often hard to follow by themselves. It's said he was a skilled lecturer. But all we have are the rough equivalent of Powerpoint slides.)
"You're that smart?"
"Let me put it this way... you ever hear of Socrates? Plato? Aristotle?"
"Yes..."
"Morons."
-Vizzini and The Dread Pirate Roberts, The Princess Bride (aka The Greatest Movie Ever)
Clearly, he wasn't that smart, after all. But he got one out of three right.
So, in sum... I don't actually make fun of Plato, per se (except when it comes to puns involving a certain clay-like squishable child's toy, but those are pretty rare). It's more that I think he's deserving of it.
4. real genius
Real Genius is a nerd movie. One of Val Kilmer's earliest film roles. Takes place at a magnet school. It's wacky, zany, and fun. It is awesome.
The only thing wrong with the movie is that it gave me unrealistic expectations for life at MIT.
5. sledgeomatic
There was a stand-up comic who was popular in the 70s and 80s by the name of Gallagher. (Sadly, his little brother ended up trying to cash in on the name by taking over the stage act and billing himself as "The Living Sequel.") Gallagher was funny. He was insightful. He had a great bit about English language spelling, for example. (That clip, as you can probably tell, is actually a mashup of a couple different bits.) You may have heard some of his one-liners. I saw a whole email once filled with them. Completely uncredited, of course. Stuff like, "Why do we drive on a parkway and park on a driveway?" Which is amusing by itself, but really gets you going as part of a whole list of 'em. And he had real one-liners like, "Remember: behind every successful man is an amazed mother-in-law."
But, though he did a number of different shows with a number of different themes, each one would end with his signature bit: The sledge-o-matic. It was an infomercial for the latest and greatest kitchen gadget. Not a slicer. Not a dicer. Not a chopper and a hopper. So what in the heck could it possibly be? Sledge-o-matic! And he'd take out a big old wooden sledgehammer and happily smash stuff to bits while explaining all the nifty features. It was messy and silly, but he managed to make it new and funny every time. And clever. Sure, it always ended with a watermellon going *splat* all over the stage (and the first three rows of the audience - who had been provided with protective clear plastic sheeting). But every once in a while, he'd surprise you. Come up with new angles, new tricks. Like once, in the middle of the bit, going through at full steam, he pulled out a light bulb. "Sledge-o-matic flattens light bulbs for easy storage!" And he did the backswing. Prepared to hit it. Faked the audience out. And then, just as they were sure it wasn't going to happen, he did it. And... it was a prop light bulb which actually smushed neatly and quietly flat without a single crack.
Really, it's hard to do it justice. You can see an early performance here, but it lacks the polish and full originality of his later work. Still, it's something. (And it's the genuine article.)
6.the confessor
Astro City is the awesomest comic book ever.
Watchmen, written during the Grim and Gritty 80s, ripped apart the superhero, kicking off the Deconstruction. It highlighted everything wrong and silly about the idea of a superhero. It showed us exactly what kind of screwed-up individuals these people must be, and asked us if, really, when you think about it, you'd trust them with your safety. It caught the cape flying by, tore it off, threw it in the mud, and stomped on it good and proper.
That is not what I want from escapist fantasy entertainment.
Astro City was created by Kurt Busiek, a brilliant comics writer who is also not fond of the Deconstruction. (Not that Alan Moore isn't brilliant, mind you. It's just that I don't like Watchmen or the movement that followed. But Moore's run on Supreme rocked - you can read it for free over on WOWIO if you want - and Top Ten is amazing.) Busiek asked a very important question. "What's the point of a Deconstruction if you don't put things back together, newer and better, afterwards?" With Astro City, he began the Reconstruction. It's carefully, lovingly crafted. Character-driven stories, gorgeous art, and a whole jaw-dropping world populated with a full variety of iconic heroes, each with his own unique origin and backstory. Most (though not all) of them are built on recognizable archetypes, but each is fully developed in his/her/its own right.
It was written back in the days before everything was done with an eye towards the inevitable TPB. The first few issues were all single-issue stories, though each added to the mythology of the whole.
The first real story arc was Confession. It's told from the point of view of a kid who leaves his rural life to pursue his dreams in the big city, but it's more about the hero who helps him fulfill those dreams. That hero is, on one level, very clearly Not Batman. He dresses in black from head to toe, lurks in dark alleys, intimidates thugs, busts up street crime, and is a brilliant and methodical detective. But the swirling black cloth is not a cape, and the bright symbol on his chest isn't a bat. The Confessor is a priest. And he has a secret.
More than that, I won't say, but... It's Astro City at its best.
7. cottage cheese w/maple syrup
What can I say? I love it. It is, IMHO, the only way to eat cottage cheese. But I can hardly get anyone else to even try it. I guess it's uniquely mine. So I have it in my interests. Both because it is uniquely mine and because I still hold out the faint hope that someone else out there will give it a shot and discover its deliciousness. Or that maybe, just maybe, there's someone else out there who has discovered it already.
Of course, it should be noted that I don't use real maple syrup for this. For one thing, I don't like the grainy texture of it. Or, for that matter, the strong flavor of pure maple. More importantly, however, I'm diabetic. So the stuff I smother my cottage cheese under is actually artificially flavored sugar-free maple syrup. But, I tell you, it works wonders on cottage cheese.
And... I spent my free time today writing all that up. So I guess I'll test the cross-poster tomorrow. But I hope you enjoyed this. :)
One more thing... Since I just posted this meme last entry, I'll ask again that if you want to play, please indicate that in your comment.
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