Year: 2010

… roll it into a little ball, throw it away somewhere and lose it.

That’s what I hope to do sometime soon, before I do actually lose it. We’re at a very busy time at the moment on the project, which is being accompanied by Great Things happening too. Lots of success at the moment, crossing fingers for some more of the same soon. It’s come through a lot of hard work from everyone* involved, me included.

I’m bushed now though – I throw everything into what I do and have a tendency to burn myself out while getting on with it.

*Did I say everyone ? Well … part of the strain I’m feeling at the moment is the expectation I seem to have as a “Go To Guy”. It’s a fine reputation to have, except it tends people to ask you to do stuff for them. Stuff they should really be doing themselves. (Definitely when it’s their own jobs they don’t seem capable of doing)

Maybe they think I’m really calm when inside, I’m being the whirling dervish going nuts trying to figure out how to do something. It’s only some people (the lazy ones) who wind me up when they push their work on to me. With other people like The Angel, our Snow Queen and Ms Sunshine, it’s a case of “why didn’t you ask sooner ?”

If a pretty lady asks me to do something, I’ll usually jump at the chance. And you know with the 3 ladies above, they’ve already tried their hardest to figure it out on their own. All I ask in return is the thank you and the smile which comes naturally. A smile from a pretty lady brightens the day like nothing else. It’s worth more than gold, platinum or the first teacake in the morning.

There you go – cooperation is gained more willingly with a smile than a “do this because I don’t want to”

It’s a bit of a shame, because it takes the gloss off the successes we’re having. Sometimes you believe that success happens despite some people rather than because of them. Maybe that’s because we have a lot of special people to make up for the lightweights.

That’s enough of that for now 🙂 Had to get it out and say it because I find it easier to deal with struggle by expressing it than if it’s bottled up to fester. (I also have a strong management chain to help fend off the more unreasonable demands)

More Top 40 time 🙂

At 30, bit of classical with Fossiles from Carnival of the Animals. This one is one of the more famous from that piece.
29 sees a bit more Kate Bush with Army Dreamers. Wonder if anyone thought when Army Dreamers was written 30 years ago that the world would see the Falklands War shortly after or that it would be in the state it’s in now. This one’s from the Never Forever album and is just about as poignant now as when it was written.
28 is another Kate Bush track with Wow. This one is from the Lionheart album and sums up Kate perfectly : Wow. I suspect listening to Kate Bush from an early age is one thing that fed my fascination with ladies with long dark hair.

27th is a track from Edie Brickell’s Ultimate Collection. It’s a track called Vodka, done with Carter Albricht. Listened to this 57 times in iTunes, it never gets old. Can’t link it though, you’ll need to get that cd 🙂
26 is one of the more beautiful songs in my collection which closes out the Scarlet and Other Stories album from All About Eve. It’s a story of The Pearl Fishermen. Very beautiful, very tragic and something else feeding that fascination from No 28.

25th and played 57 times is Alisha’s Attic describing my normal state of being : Late Again. This one is another of my extensive Alisha’s Attic B-side collection.
At 24 is another Alisha’s Attic track, one of the signature tracks from their first album. I Am, I Feel, which kinda sums up the feelings I was pouring out up top 🙂 (TOTP’s disaster of a sound department strikes again!) No miming here 🙂

23 is the only entry in the Top 40 from Sleeper, with Click … Off … Gone. Proving that it’s not just good vocals needed for great songs, the music around this one makes it stand out.
22 is Something from The Beatles. If there’s anything that describes Love, it’s this song.
Finally for today’s part of the Top 40, it’s Scarlet by All About Eve which has had 58 listens so far.

Time to round off a Wall Of Text with something I know somebody’s going to be looking for … There’s a band I’ve been introduced to recently that isn’t in this Top 40 cos of the head starts the All About Eve’s, Kate Bush’s and Alisha’s Attic had. They’re on the Patrol with one of my favourites from these guys : Chasing Cars.

Eternal Flame. One of my favorite song. It makes me go to sleep easily. My anti-insomnia. Love it!

Before I dive into the main post, wanting to say something about a colleague. She was involved in a car accident yesterday and is in hospital at the moment … Fingers crossed she comes through ok. She’s a lovely lady, hopefully we’ll see her again very soon.

Top 40 ! Since iTunes arrived, I pick out my music by looking at what’s the longest since played and least amount played. With a library of over 4000 tracks, this gets me cycling through the collection fairly well. But … because I’ve added music over several years, the tunes which have been in there since the start have an unfair advantage in the Most Played list. Also, cos they’ve been played a lot they don’t tend to get added in again as random picks.

So I’m thinking of doing a reset so I listen to some of the older amazing tracks more. Bit more time to come before I do that though, as I have a new Cardigans album to play through. What have I listened to most pre reset ?

Top 40 Part 1 : 40 to 31. (Reverse order is kinda traditional !)
(and all the links are to Youtube or a lyrics site)

40 : Rainy Days and Mondays by The Carpenters. Hopefully today won’t be a rainy day as I’m using some well earned flexi time credit to watch the cricket.

39 : Another classic : Yesterday by the Beatles. By the amount of stuff to do at work, sometimes we wish for Yesterday so we have the time to do it all.

38 : Brainstorm by Alisha’s Attic. No Youtube link cos this is a b-side 🙂 I have pretty much everything Alisha’s Attic ever released and there’s some cracking tracks out there which never reached albums. “You’re captured by me not her” – definitely when listening to the Poole sisters 🙂

37 : Night of the Swallow by Kate Bush. This one is a track off The Dreaming that really shows off Kate’s voice.

36 : Milk by Garbage. This one closes out their first album. My impression of an album tends to be dominated by how it finishes and this one is an excellent “take me home” track.

35 : St Swithin’s Day by Dubstar. It’s a shame that the only thing in my Top 40 for Dubstar is a cover version but they really break the cover version pattern by doing an excellent job of it. I’ll put another Dubstar track or two in a Not Top 40 bit 🙂

34 : Edie Brickell +1 with Like I Do Now. This one comes off the Edie Brickell Ultimate Collection (more later!) which isn’t just a re-release of the best tracks off the albums, it brings a few rare tracks in too. This is one of the better.

33 : Eternal Flame by the Bangles. Am I only dreaming ? Feel like it listening to these girls 🙂

32 : Hide Child by All About Eve. This is another in the close out of album category, this time it’s All About Eve’s Touched By Jesus. Beautiful, beautiful (and haunting) song. “Hide Child, who can I be looking for …” (lyrics link)

Finally for today,
31 : Little Shotgun by Alisha’s Attic. Another B-side, chilled out sounding until you listen to the words …

I’ve listened to these tracks over and over in past years, never get tired of them. But … there’s a few more out there which I haven’t had as long, here’s a few that won’t appear in the Top 40 simply because I’ve not had them long enough :

03.45 am No Sleep by the Cardigans. Listened to this one again and it stopped me in my Warcraft grinding tracks. Tracks this good force you to pay attention.

What’s a Girl To Do by Bat For Lashes. Babe, Bunnies, Bikes, need I say more ? (This track got my sister and me hooked)

Finally, here’s hoping for a Future Love Paradise.

More in a week or so 🙂

Spotted this story earlier and it raised an eyebrow or two :

Good dancing may be sign of male health.

It’s saying that blokes who dance well, in particular the core body areas of torso, neck and head, are more attractive. I think there’s something to this, although they’re missing some of the point as is usual for Crazy (read qualitative instead of quantitative) Science.

True – a person who moves well is (to me), far more attractive than someone who walks like a duck. But then again, you can move well in one sphere and then be a total clutz in others. I bet most of the dancers out there can’t sprint half as quick as I can and I bet they would cry MOMMY when faced with a cricket ball coming at them. But they look good due to having heaps of practice.

That’s actually like a few of the cricketers I see in the teams I play for and against. They’ll talk the talk but when it comes to actually doing, they’re either utterly uncoordinated or too scared to do the business. They look after themselves instead of putting it on the line for the team.

Doh – straying off the point again (like usual !)

I think there’s something to all this dancing makes you look good lark. It’s a healthy exercise, keeps you moving and practicing good coordination of movement will keep you fitter and trimmer. Being coordinated is a good sign that someone is physically healthy. Using me again, I have good days and bad days where some days everything will just click and I’ll be fine. Other days, one of the long term injuries will pop up and remind me it’s there and I’ll be hiding limps.

I judge my own health on how quietly I walk. I usually walk pretty quickly (no worries about watching for people overtaking !) but it’s the efficiency I aim for. That means being able to creep up behind people and make them jump (muahahaa). If my legs aren’t too healthy then I’ll be clomping along instead of ghosting along.

How’s my walking relate to dancing ? I’ll never be a great dancer, as my physique definitely works against me. Ignoring the belly (which doesn’t actually restrict my movement that much), I have massive leg muscles. They’re bigger than they should be, which means I wear knee pads when running to stop them blowing up my knees. I sprint very quickly, although I missed out on competition at school due to injuring my back.

Those leg muscles work against me though. Very fast in a straight line but the extra mass as tricky to get moving. A case of having too much power. Cue : Dad Dancer. When I am moving though, change of direction comes quick and easy.

Another example – I occasionally get drawn into the horse racing world. Rarely to bet because I’m a firm believer in the result changing when you get sight of it. If I don’t bet, my pick wins, if I bet then my pick fails. Meh. I make my pick by looking at form but mostly by seeing how the horse moves. However … it’s all well and good the horse moving beautifully at a walk, they’re not going to be walking on the course. What really counts is attitude, frame and whether you believe that horse is going to Go Real Fast. A horse that goes like a donkey at the walk can often be lightning at a gallop.

It’s curious how things change in the subconscious. In our hunter gatherer days, it would have been the fast runners, the efficient hunters and the endurance people who would have caught the eye. Now, it’s the people who look coordinated standing still who catch the eye.

I definitely support the general premise of the theory : dancing shows off how healthy and structurally sound a body is. But I’d disagree about it being indicative of anything more than that. Being able to dance well doesn’t mean you have a brain, doesn’t say anything about personality* and doesn’t say how clever those fingers are at massaging out tension.

*(good dancer could actually indicate an undesirable personality due to an over abundance of Self Focus – never been too interested in those who cannot empathise with others)

Maybe a little practice would lead to better dancing 🙂 In the meantime, I’ll bemoan the luck of being able to sprint like lightning but be a total clutz on the dancefloor :-).

Ok, so I went back to Warcraft.

I’ve had a love hate relationship with this game over the years and just got back into it after 7 months away (longer than that, as the last session was a 5 day freebie after another long break). There’s a kind of hunger with addiction, with one of my addictions being gaming. You have to get the right fix to satisfy the addiction. Sometimes mine gets satisfied with beating the AI in games like Settlers IV and Moo2.

It appears that with the closing of the cricket season, the hunger for nonstop gaming is back. All addictions tend to come with some kind of cost, my gaming addiction isn’t an exception there. For me, it’s late nights where I stop in game for far too long. Not enough sleep doesn’t do much for my being human the next day. Itunes actually helps there, as I’ll queue up albums along with the random stuff. The start of an album is a good marker for a “if I stay one more track, I’ll be here for an hour”, which gives an excellent excuse to break off at 1am and get shuteye otherwise I’d stay until daybreak.

There’s other costs too. Some of my games place physical demands that mount up after a while. Computer games causing physical issues ? Yeah baby yeah. I’ve been around pooters for 30 years now and have the associated RSI in my wrist. Curiously, some games actually help the wrist problem. Must start that Mass Effect adventure again. Warcraft attacks my shoulder too, to the point where I’m in actual pain from it.

Day off today. Only gaming today has been 1:1 in Settlers IV (may start another after this post). We had a Call To Arms in Eve too (Eve’s addiction cost is mind numbness from tedium) which I avoided because it clashed with England cricket on telly.

I know I have this particular addiction, along with a few others. Knowing you have an issue is one step along the way to controlling it. I’m having fun at the moment though, so I think I’m just gonna ride with it.

The Warcraft guild I’m associated with at the moment is called Violence Reborn. It’s dominated by Scandinavians ganging up with English members. Like all internet communities, we have people from all over the place. One of our recruitment questions is “If you were caught in the middle of a gang war between English and Swedish people, which side would you join and why ?” Gaming needs to be about fun. If the fun goes out, it becomes a second job. That’s one reason I struggle with Eve, the occasional PvP I do doesn’t make up for the second job grind.

VR has a lot of great people, guild chat is great fun to join in with. Crazy people make you laugh. I’m really glad they took me in when things got unbearable on Maelstrom. Eve has good people too, Luth and the other English Cultists are great mates.

And that’s the key to the addiction to that particular game. Single player games are good for a few play throughs but there’s only so many times you can listen to the same dialogue or so many times you can execute the Killer Tactic before needing something different. With MMOs, you’re interacting with real people and there’s no script.

I’ve come a cropper a few times there, my previous WoW existence on the Maelstrom server earned me a fair bit of respect as a player but was also blighted by a few incidents that I could have handled better. I’m still friends with a lot of people on that server (most of whom moved to Blade’s Edge with VR) but there’s a few things that could have gone … better. Although with one or two of those, “better” would have involved hiring a hitman. Yes, I have had death threats from people who couldn’t recognise their own addictions.

Errrr – where was I ?

Gaming addiction – reactivated
Antsy feeling of “there’s something I should be doing” – sorted
(I did the washing up earlier)
Shoulder killing me – check

There’s a good reason (or am I just telling myself this) for the gaming too – it allows me to kick my brain into a different mode of working. Normally, I’m multitasking and taking in 3 or 4 inputs at once. Like at the moment, I’m tapping out this post while listening to music, watching the tennis and switching tabs to forums and Facebook. When I’m gaming, I tunnel vision focus in which allows the higher reasoning part of my brain to switch off and get some sleep. I do the same at work, by opening Spider Solitaire at lunchtime and going Robot on it. It gives the bit of my brain that does the thinking to take a break.

Oh dear. This is turning into Wall Of Text territory again. I think I’ll leave it by attacking something the Eve players say :

“In Warcraft, you have to go looking for pvp. In Eve, the pvp looks for you.”

Not true. In Eve, the Empire regions has active police who will intervene if fights break out (unless you’re at war). On my previous Warcraft server, everywhere except cities and starting zones was a PvP zone. Members of the opposite faction would come in and grief you. Nowhere to hide, unlike Eve which has stations.

So – Eve players, you have it easy. Kinda true for the WoW server I’m on now too, which operates more like Eve’s Empire. Time to feed the addiction again ! Although I’ll avoid WoW again tonight because of that shoulder which still hates me.

More cricket gear buying today, as I looked to take advantage of End Of Season Sales.

Risky – cos I’ve had a spectacularly bad record with kit buying this year and the place I went (Globe Sports) has some Very Expensive Bats that are incredibly tempting.

Two (ok, three) bits of kit walked out of the shop : Knee pads and a new bag. I wear knee pads not so much because I expect ligaments or tendons to go BOOM, they’re more there for impact protection. My knees used to be weak but appear to have somewhat caught up with my leg muscles now.

I figure, I’m a fairly average sized fella, so I choose “Medium” thinking they’ll have enough stretch to fit without slipping annoyingly. Medium works out to 13-15″. I get them home and attempt to try them on. Huge feelings of deja vu erupt as my mind goes back to the whites I bought to save me doing the washing. That time, 30″ waist whites did actually go on, these knee pads didn’t even go over my calves. I measured the circumferences as 17.5″ calf muscles and 17″ knees. Big Calves = Very Fast Sleepy.

Oh well. Back to Globe tomorrow and the torture of seeing that Salix Daemon bat on the shelf.

What else did I get ? A cricket bat is a fairly specialised beastie, even though I’m fairly light on gear I’m still looking to drag along the following to a game :

Helmet
Batting pads
Batting gloves (only one pair, some have many)
Bat
Fielding spikes (I wear flat shoes for batting due to shuffling)
Sleevy jumper (which may be older than me)
Non sleevy jumper (20 years old)
Bat hammer + bat repair tape
Box
Shin pads (not that I ever wear them)
Spare hat + cap (don’t wear these now either)
Drink bottles + occasional munchies

(there’s a picture or two in this linked earlier post)

That’s quite a bit of gear to carry around, most of it is awkwardly shaped too. A bat is 38 inches long and 4.25 inches wide, which can be a pain to fit in the boot of some cars (Puma struggled), let alone fit in a normal holdall.

The new bag is a Gray Nicolls Atomic bag, which holds the bat in an outside pocket. Everything else goes inside, even the helmet. That’s a first for me, since getting it the helmet has lived outside the bag. This should be better if I’m caught out in the field while it rains. My rainhat lives outside the bag, if it goes inside it’ll get the brim squished.

There’s a few things in there that I don’t use but I take ’em along out of habit. I still have the hat I was wearing when I got whacked on the nose (and it still has the occasional blood splat). I don’t wear it but it’s a good reminder.

So – taking advantage of cheaper prices but still keeping the moderation to stop me buying a new bat or new spikes. My current fielding spikes are falling to bits like my old bag. The retired bag served me well, I’ve had it since I started playing cricket 20 years ago and it has survived everything. Including things like a coke can (I’ve learned Coke + Sport = BAD) exploding inside it. Old bag was starting to fall apart at the seams though. There’s only so much jerky pickup of heavy stuff a bag can take before the fabric splits.

Oh yeah – the new bag has wheels …

PS Pakistan betting scandal is getting to be tedious old news. Want it gone, bored of it.

If you can’t laugh at bad stuff …

Original artist : Arun Ramkunar, saw it and couldn’t resist borrowing.

And that’s a post title no one would expect from me !

So what’s cooking ? Let’s take you through the ingredients as you mix them all together.

First. Prepare your work space and implements of choice. Dust free is Good, also make sure it’s well lit. Implements should be fit for purpose and if they’re magnetic, PUT THEM DOWN AND STEP AWAY ! Magnetic stuff picks up screws ok but if you move Iron through a magnetic field, the change in that field induces an electric current. Which, with sensitive electronics, is Very Bad.

Take your Thermaltake case and add power supply. (Novatech unit or OCUK). Gloves can be useful here so you don’t fingerprint the box. For most satisfaction, go for extreme beefiness. Going lean tends to lead to fainting through hunger later.

(if not enough power is available, the system will “Brown Out”. Think of it as a pastry which starts to rise and then goes FLUMF – flat as a pancake)

When the trays are prepared, turn your attention to the cake. For today’s cake, we’ll use an Asus P6X58D-E motherboard as the sponge, with a liberal coating of Intel i7 930 icing on top. Applying the icing is really fiddly, too much pressure or an unsteady hand can lead to big dents in your cake. Dents are bad. (Especially as an Intel i7 930 processor costs £180+VAT!)

So, we have our sponge cake with its icing but the job isn’t done yet. We need candles ! Zalman give us the sparkly things here, in the form of a CNPS10X Extreme cooler. Lots of care needed again here to stop the candles breaking through that icing.

What’s left ? Hundreds and thousands to sprinkle on that icing, as well as those shiny silvery thingys. Let’s bring out the GeForce 460 to make this thing look purdy.

Carefully slide it on to the plate (our box has a plate that you put everything on before fixing it in) we made earlier and we’re almost ready.

Add a few wafers (Samsung 1TB hard disc and 6GB of memory) and that cake of our’s is almost ready for the party. We’re missing music and a movie ! Bring out the blu-ray drive and a screen (by Samsung again) and it’s ready to roll.

Back to reality …

I’m having a thunk about changing my PC stuff again. What I have now has served me pretty well, greatly helped by the upgrade to the graphics from 18 months ago. It is starting to hit the ragged edge of what it can do though, so it’s time to start researching now so that when I buy in 6-12 months, I’ll be choosing bits from a position of strength instead of ignorance.

I’m quite likely to buy a screen before that though, as my 17″ 4:3 display feels very cramped. I can’t see the point in buying anything other than a touchscreen compatible display, so it’ll be a good few months before I part with any money.

The garbled stuff above is an attempt to say how you put a home brew PC together, helped out by the experience I have with the series of home build boxes I’ve done before. It does aid if you know roughly what order to put things together in, to anticipate having your access closed off. There’s also stuff like needing to Push Really Hard to slot things in, best to do that when you can brace what you’re pushing so it doesn’t flex and break.

There’s a bit more to it as well. The electronics are very sensitive, so it’s wise to have a Tame Geek to take you through the precautions needed. Even an innocent finger tip can fry a processor – think of how you jump when you get that spark when you touch the car door and then imagine that spark going into electronic stuff just 45nm across.

Right – The geeks are probably wondering what kind of thing would I get ?

Monitor – at least 22″ widescreen, although I’ll need a home for my current one before I jump.
Thermaltake TT-V3BLAC box – looks ok, cheap, should keep bits cool and neat, Solid name.
Novatech/OCUK power supply – risky going for a no-name as a bad PSU will break the rest of the bits in the box when it goes bang. But if it’s half the price for more grunt …

Forums are useful as well here, Google is a powerful tool if you’re looking for fairly impartial views on kit. Apply X-Files logic though : “Trust No One”.

Zalman CNPS10X Extreme cooler – it’s worth going for the most expensive, biggest cooler in the shop as it’ll keep your system cool while being Very Quiet. I hardly notice my current desktop.
Asus motherboard and Intel cpu – this is a departure for me, the last Intel chip I had was a 486 around 14 years ago. Intel have been making strides forward while AMD have stood somewhat still.
6GB memory – desktop is struggling with 2GB and it’s a choice of 3 or 6. 3 would be close to struggle with games, 6 gives a lot more headroom. I’d want to follow my current desktop which has two hard discs (one Windows, one games) but Ultra Fast solid state drives aren’t cheap enough yet.
Graphics from GeForce – another change, as I sacked the makers of these around 8 years ago due to breakages and bad drivers. The wheel turns full circle …

That’s most of the bits I’d think of getting. I’ve mentioned a few hardware makers in this post :

Asus – had a couple of motherboards from these guys and they are Solid. A motherboard is the foundation of a system, you want it to be granite.
Zalman – they look pretty, they keep stuff cool, they’re quiet. Cost a bit more but they are 100% value for money.
Novatech – they have a shop within easy driving distance and they earned themselves an excellent reputation from their first store in Portsmouth.
Samsung – these guys will take over the world. They have the best R&D ideas and after 1 monitor, 2 TV’s, 1 hard disc which are all high quality, I have no reason (yet!) to go elsewhere. No regrets from going to these guys again.

I’ve made no mention at all of speakers or keyboard and mice … These things are so Personal Choice that if someone does recommend one, don’t listen. Go to a shop, fiddle with the keyboards and mice, see what you like best. It’s your keyboard and mouse and your fingers and hands are different shapes to the reviewer person.

Personal Choice Rules.

I won’t be buying new hardware yet … But I have started thinking about it 🙂

PS The i7 930 processor I’m looking at has more than double the memory on the chip than my first PC had for system memory.
PS2 Somebody mention CAKE ?

There’s a TV writer out there called Joss Whedon.

He cut his teeth with a series called Buffy, which while rather decently catching the popculture of its time is not something I’ve got a hankering to watch over again.

Not so with Firefly.

Could be that it’s sci-fi, which is a genre I take to like people to air (or chavs to alcohol). Could be the down to earth characters. Could be the ‘verse it is set in. Could be the wit that was sewn into the interactions. Could be the ship, small and humble and with a design that Made Sense.

I’m definitely one of the geekier members of the engineer species (hey, I’d chase Kaylee !) and I tend to look out for things like : Would that ship fly. How do you get around it. Multiple routes around in case of fire. Where’s the cables, where’s the vents. Big cargo hold, how do you get stuff in. Yeah, I’m sad, I spot those kind of things and if they aren’t thought about properly I’ll get bored, peeved and shortening in attention span. To that geekus engineeri, Serenity is perfect. The design makes sense and doesn’t succumb to the hell of the Plot Device.

(watching The Deep at the moment, which is getting killed by Plot Devices)

Everything about the tech underneath Firefly is simple. What do they say about good lies ? Keep it simple and it’ll be more believable. Scifi is and always will be a pack of lies. But it’s a pack of lies designed to entertain. If the creators (inc production and direction) try to overcomplicate (a la RTD), they quickly get caught out in the fiction they’re trying to portray as inconsistencies cut out the sense.

Firefly’s all about the 10 core characters and how they are trying to make their way in the ‘Verse. Bit like the David Eddings books, they succeed by allowing the reader/watcher have fun sharing in with the interactions. All 10 have their part to play, whether it be Inara putting the Captain in his place or Serenity digging the crew out of the mess they’ve gotten into. Yes, the ship is a vital part of the cast in a way that I don’t think has been realised since the Liberator or U-96.

I suspect we identify well with them because “They’re Just Like Us”. There’s a bit of a disconnect with series like Star Trek or Stargate, because the characters are just a little too elite. We don’t feel as if we’d fit in, except as someone to clean the boots or hold the doors open. Firefly’s different, you could picture yourself as part of that crew or along for the ride.

They include you in their tale in a way that not much fiction achieves. Except maybe those Eddings books. They’re real people, despite only existing in that small screen.

And that’s Firefly’s big secret. You don’t talk about the tech, you talk about whether Inara and Mal will tell each other how they feel. You’re looking for how Doc Simon is going to put his foot in his mouth again. What’s Serenity going to let them do. What precisely is Jayne going off to do in his bunk. (Don’t answer that last one, in fact, I apologise for putting the image in your head)

You can probably guess that I’ve just done a Firefly marathon 🙂

Enjoyed every minute too of watching the entire far too short run of 15 episodes with the film Serenity being watched tonight. Most scifi series go on too long or are killed off too early. Not often do you get the feeling of Unfinished Business. That’s definitely the feeling with Firefly, there are far more stories to be told in the ‘Verse. Will we ever get to hear them ? Probably not. But I’m keener to hear those stories than I am the stories of B5: Crusade or Defying Gravity. And I was crushed to hear those get canned. The stories and the writing is what counts.

Huge shame that this one was cancelled just as it was really getting going. I have a hankering to watch those 15 episodes again !

Wanted : a seat on a Firefly class transport, will happily be Engineer’s Assistant. Keep your Galaxy Class, your White Star, your NX-01, your Nebulon B, your Daedalus or even your Battlestar (original one, not the rubbish new one).

Gis proper starship. (Would settle for a spot on a Leviathan)

Muahaha – that makes me wish even more I'd got it checked out in A&E, so I could have the trophies of :

X-Ray film (if they give it out)
Cast off cast 🙂