strange radiation: the pool of radiance archive
Adventures with an unreliable narrator.
« November 2004 | Main | January 2005 »
Dec 30 04: call for help
Just so I know where to find it later, and for the edification of anybody listening: a website that lists Amazon.com’s secret customer-service telephone number, which is presently 800.201.7575. Well, it’s not secret, exactly, but it’s well and deliberately hidden. (Via this article in the Times.)
Dec 27 04: december
I have this theory: that the inner surface of the womb, as experienced through intervening layers of vernix and seawater and membrane, must feel a great deal like flannel sheets.
I mean, what else would explain how good it feels to sleep between them, when the weather is cold and the nights are long?
With that in mind, I’m going to heap praise upon the husband for a moment about my christmas present: flannel-lined jeans from LL Bean. Not only did they keep me warm as I staggered to work this morning—damn, it is cold out there—but they have the added benefit of being Peace and Love Trousers. Put them on and you are suffused with peace and love.
Oh, yes.
UPDATED: to get my fetal-development terminology right. I knew I should have fact-checked that bit.
Dec 22 04: sally forth, sally field
So it’s happened a second time: the pool of radiance has been selected as a blog of note by a total stranger. Much like the first time it happened, I’m at least as surprised as I am flattered. I guess I can accept that people I don’t know from nobody will see excerpts from this thing via its Livejournal mirror; Livejournal is like that, you know. But my website?
As much as the Web is all about this kind of promiscuous and tangential linkage, it always surprises me that anybody bothers to wander all the way over to my little tract of hypothetical real-estate. I’m hardly running a scintillating salon like TNH’s, or a directory of wonderful things. But the other day I got a comment from somebody in Sweden. I don’t know anybody in Sweden. How did they find me? Was it something I said, or just a Google search gone awry?
Sooner or later I’ll get over this, I guess. But at least for now, please allow me to continue to be entertained by the smallness of the world. Random strangers, honored guests: Hi.
Dec 20 04: frostjacked
Okay, winter is now here. Last night’s snow is pretty much gone already, but damn is it cold out, and everyone in the office is afflicted with outrageous hat-head.
While I’m sort of on the subject, I’d also like to say that Fountains of Wayne’s “I Want an Alien for Christmas” is possibly the dumbest holiday song in the history of the universe. Maybe there’s a layer of irony I’m missing here, I don’t know. But it’s in heavy rotation these days at the place where I get my morning blueberry-banana-protein smootie and every time I hear it I start to ponder acts of superlative violence. Anyway, you can go read the lyrics, on the blog of a person I have never met before but who can probably be trusted not to spring umpty-skillion pop-up windows on you, and that may give you the beginnings of an idea of what I’m talking about.
UPDATED: Link fixed. Plus I just noticed that Mr. BigRedGiant offeres the actual song for actual download! So you, too, can experience the inanity!
Dec 18 04: retraction
No, I take it back. It’s busted. It just waited until 50 seconds into the movie to freeze up this time.
@#$%^!!
Dec 17 04: tantalus lives
a continuation of last night’s gripping technodrama…
Out of a perverse sense of curiousity I popped the DVDs back into the player this morning. I wanted to try to get an idea of what was going on, because I had this idea that maybe one of those ten-dollar lens cleaning kits might be of use; the player is over four years old, now, and the apartment is indeed dusty. This being New York.
(Everybody can see this coming, right?)
It all worked perfectly. Turned it on and off a half-dozen times, and it booted cleanly every time.
I suppose I should be rejoicing at the device’s resurrection, but I have to go to work instead. There’s no time in the schedule for rejoicing until tomorrow at the earliest…
Dec 16 04: fie.
So I busted my ass to get home from work tonight at a reasonable hour. I had purchased the Return of the King 4-disc extravaganza on Tuesday but tonight was the first night I was going to be home. We have been out of our minds with the busy for the last several days—Christmas concerts with the NY Pops this weekend—so we won’t really have a chance to breathe until Sunday. Except for tonight.
And of course, tonight was the night the DVD player died the true death. You can put a disc in, but it either doesn’t load at all or it gets a little way into the hey-here’s-the-main-menu introduction and freezes solid.
Damn! And also Blast! And even Crap! My night of exquisite geekery, shot to hell. Now I’m researching DVD players instead. (Anybody with a recommendation is encouraged to make one right quick. I’m gonna screen the movie this weekend if it kills me.)
Dec 15 04: get cultural!
Anybody who’ll be in the vicinity of New York City next month is cordially invited:
BRAHMS: EIN DEUTSCHES REQUIEM
and others
Juilliard Choral Union and Juilliard Orchestra
James “Jimmy” DePriest, conductor
Carnegie Hall
January 22, 2005
The most expensive seats in the house will cost you $25. Rumor has it that there are still very good seats available. This is going to be a truly fabulous performance. Carnegie is that big brick place on 57th Street.
For more details or to purchase tickets, go to the Carnegie website.
Hope to see you there.
Dec 11 04: how to: waste some time
I’ve been accumulating links to interesting ways of passing one’s idle hours. Not that I have any of those at the moment, but still. Rather than add them all to the quarks list, I thought I’d put them here. You have been warned.
- The Kingdom of Loathing
- An adventurer is you! Go on quests, fight the Penguin Mafia, make cocktails, try to find a cheap source of Hell Ramen.
- WeBoggle
- You know, the game with the letter cubes? Play it online against total strangers.
- The HalfBakery
- A “communal database of original, fictitious inventions, edited by its users,” only smarter and funnier than it may sound. Begin with the hilarious Shag My Bird! or the ingenious Stringball to get an idea of what I mean.
There. Go forth and accomplish nothing. Well, nothing useful, anyway.
this just in
Kate Bush decloaked the other day to make an announcement to her fan club: it’s nearly done. “It” being her tenth studio album, the title of which is still unknown. It’ll be out sometime next year—one rumor pegs it at the Ides of March, but at this point I’ll believe nothing until I have it in my actual hands.
For those of you trying to do the math, “The Red Shoes” (aka studio album number nine) was released in 1993. Yeah, that’s about what it felt like.
Dec 9 04: pigtails and joy
Because the world always needs more cuteness, I have added a number of new photographs to the Big Gallery of Avery. Dare to resist the power of my adorable niece.
Go on, just try.
space available in chic west-side neighborhood
Dear Pale Male:
I was horrified to hear about what happened to your home (To the people at 927 5th Avenue: Boo! Boo, I say!) Most New Yorkers feel the same. Indeed, even a news service thousands of miles away has run a story about your cruel eviction. And while I’m powerless to get you your old nesting site back, I thought I’d try to help out by suggesting a different neighborhood, one that would be a wonderful place to raise your family.
Have you considered Hell’s Kitchen? We’ve got some tallish buildings, and we’re not far from Central Park—under a quarter-mile as the hawk flies. Our relaxed, no-pretensions local culture would be far less uptight about evidence of your presence. Best of all, we have a sizeable local flock of pigeons that are fat and stupid and ripe for the harvest. We’d love to see you take as many of them out as you can catch. High ceilings. Pre-war. Move in right away. No fee.
What do you say? Drop by for a walk-through anytime you like.
Dec 8 04: wotd
Hello, it’s Wednesday the 8th of December 2004, and the Word of the Day for today is uparmour.
the walk
So on my lunch break today I went down to the comic shop and nosed around to see what was new. And what to my wondering eyes should appear but Girl Genius #13! Huzzah!
The next step was supposed to have been sandwich acquisition, but it wasn’t. I had read the first couple of pages of the new GG while waiting at the comic-shop register and my head was awhirl with new narrative and in the end I had to sit down in some plaza-full-of-benches somewhere and read the rest because I just couldn’t take it anymore. I am still chuckling at random intervals about the fun and fabulousness the Foglios managed to cram into those 24 pages.
Then I got up and went to get me a sandwich and on the way I saw this guy on the street who had an actual waxed and curled handlebar moustache.
The world, I tell you, is an excellent place to live.
Dec 6 04: h.o.m.o.
To: Scott Kurtz, creator, PvP
Re: Your December 5 strip
Dear Scott—
I love Player vs. Player. I read it every day. I annoyed the whole damn office with the drum-kit-falls-off-a-cliff joke last week.
But.
When the day’s gag is: “There are these guys? And they’re called HOMO? Ha ha ha!”, I have trouble seeing the joke.
No, that’s not quite right—maybe I do see the joke, I just don’t think it’s funny. It smacks of that whole ‘gay is shorthand for general states of dumb/stupid/bad/worthy of derision ’ thing. That’s something that I guess would be funny, or at least in character, if it were being delivered entirely by Francis, but the way you’ve developed the gag doesn’t do that. It’s just floating around in the general PvP universe, and I was a little surprised.
Here’s why I feel this way: In grade school and middle school and high school, to call somebody a fag is the biggest insult you can sling, right? Gayness is still, after all these years, the best way to indicate that somebody or something is, you know, uncool and gross and stupid and ugly and all those things we’re not supposed to be. Surely you remember how this goes. And when you’re a little queer boy or girl and you get this idea drummed into your head day after day after day, it can make pulling your shit together and growing up into a healthy (yea, cool even) adult way harder than it oughtta be. It leaves a mark. As a result, the ‘homo, ha ha’ thing provokes strong reactions. Perhaps I’m overreacting today, even; but it’s really hard for me to respond any other way. The urge to put on my Flames of Wrath™ and come out swingin’ is strong and immediate.
I guess my point here, Scott, is that you’re twiddling an awfully raw nerve in service of the joke. I wanted to make sure you were aware of it.
We can still be friends, though. I’m looking forward to Monday’s strip, and I remain
A big gay PvP fan,
Andy Willett
ps: In the interest of full disclosure, I’m also a Mac user. But we can do the whole Mac/PC thing all you like. I can take the joke there, no problem.
Dec 2 04: alas, poor lois
Anybody looking to waste a little time at the office—not me, to be sure; I’m far too busy for that sort of thing—might be amused by this look at the brain-wrenching and hilarious world of Lois Lane, Superman’s Girlfriend. Yes, Lois had her own comic book, and it was a huge seller. LL,SG ran from 1958 to 1974 and published about 140 issues. But the real question is: in the pre-ironic world, who on Earth bought this stuff?
Because there’s some crazy, crazy things on those covers. Lois the empress; Lois the executioner; Lois the gorilla; Lois the Black-woman-for-a-day. Lois, either doing everything she can think of (and she can think of a lot, apparently) to marry Superman or weeping because Supermann won’t marry her or marrying somebody else to spite the Man of Steel. Lois, granted super-powers, which she uses for good or evil depending on the month. Lois, rescuing Superman. Lois, murdering Superman.
Anyway, somebody on the forum started a thread to examine the weirder moments in Lois Lane covers. As the pile-on picked up speed, people started putting in covers from Superman’s Pal, Jimmy Olsen, a book legendary for its own excursions into the surreal. There’s also an appearance by Rainbow Batman, about whom the less said the better.
Last I checked, the thread had hit 33 pages with no signs of stopping. Go see, when you have some free time. Be aware that the pages contain lots of big images (this will be tough on dialup users) and that it contains some mildly spicy language from time to time. Thanks to BoingBoing for the tip.
UPDATED: If the link above doesn’t work, try Superdickery.com. The allspark thread, as it spun out of control, was putting outrageous demands on bandwidth—so a whole online museum has been created to give this vital field of study a permanent nerve center.
Dec 1 04: world aids day, 2004
The clouds are whizzing eastward over Manhattan, high winds carrying them out over Long Island and the Atlantic as the sun sinks in the west. World AIDS Day has come round again, and as usual I find myself thinking of Mark. But as much as he is still loved, and his absence still felt, it feels wrong for me to sink into melancholy. It feels more important to think about those around me who we haven’t lost, the ones who take their meds and live their lives and whose health we try not to worry about when we don’t see them for a while. I’d rather find ways to help those we still have stick around than simply remember those who are gone.
So this is for Todd, and Jimbo, and Buck. Hi, guys. Hang in there.