Geeked Off!

I have been neglecting this blog. Fall is a crazy busy time for us.

Anyhow, I saw a delightful post (ages ago, now) over on Earnest Parening about how Amy has supersonic hearing. It inspired me to write about the superpowers granted to a woman when she gives birth.

Supersonic Hearing

Let’s start with this one. As Amy’s post proves, moms have supersonic hearing. We can hear our children in another room. Oh yeah, your mom heard what you muttered under your breath. She may have said, “Excuse me?” but she heard you.

Mom Spit

Mom spit can clean the rust off a bumper. There is no mess too powerful for mom spit. I know it’s embarrassing to have mom wipe your face off in public, but she’ll get it way cleaner than you ever could.

Eyes in the Back of Her Head

Yes, your mom can see what you’re doing without even looking at you. She saw that pack of gum you stole from the drugstore when you were seven. She saw that face you made when she told you to clean your room. She is all seeing.

Mess Detection

Moms can sense a mess a mile away. They know when you shoved all your toys into your closet because they can sense the mess. It’s like Spiderman’s spidersense…only momified.

Deadly Glare

Mom can make you stop dead in your tracks just by looking at you. She doesn’t need to yell or reprimand you. You may not even know what you did wrong, but you know you’re in trouble just from the look. She can kill small forest creatures with that look.

Precognition

Ever wonder how your mom knew you were thinking about grabbing a cookie or doing some other awful thing? She can see the future. That’s why she can say, “Don’t touch the cookies” before you’ve even formed the tought in your mind.

What other super powers do moms have?

This Friday, September 19th, is Talk Like a Pirate Day. No, I’m not making it up. Yes, I realize I have an unhealthy obsession with pirates. If it were up to me, every day would be Talk Like a Pirate Day. Instead, I settle for annoying coworkers and friends just one day a year. Yes, MonkeyBoy gets a kick out of this day.

I’m going to make a list of pirate-y sayings and words to hang on my cube to encourage my coworkers to get into the spirit of the day. For example,

Pirate to English Translations

Feel free to drop the ‘g’ on any word ending in ‘ing.’ Just remember, people still need to understand you or it won’t be fun.

• Ahoy! - Hello
• Arrr! - Use whenever possible
• Avast! - Exclamation like Dude! or Sweet!
• Aye! - Yes
• Be - Are, as in “I be celebratin’ tonight!”
• Charge!  - Let’s do it!
• Lest - For fear that
• Lilly Livered - Scared, chicken, ‘frady pants.
• Loot - Treasure!
• Me Hearties - My Friends
• O’ - Of, as in a day o’ lootin’ and pillagin’
• Pillage -The act of acquiring loot…better known as stealing.
• Thar - There
• Ye - You
• Yer - Your
• Yo Ho Ho - Hey hey hey! Fat Albert style.

Pirate Vocabulary

• Bilge Rat - The bilge is the lowest level of a ship. It’s usually gross and wet. A bilge rat works down there. It’s the worst job on the ship. So calling someone a bilge rat is insulting, like calling them a poopy head…only worse.
• Grog - Technically, grog is watered down rum. It’s a cheap alcoholic drink. Think of the stuff you used to buy in college. That’s grog. On Talk Like a Pirate Day, you can use grog to refer to any drink.
• Land Lubber - Essentially, a land lubber is someone who’s not a sailor or pirate. It’s a bit of an insult, but not as much as bilge rat. So it’s like calling someone a poopy head…for real.
• Jolly Roger - The skull & crossbones on pirate flags. Get creative with this one. Yes, you have my permission to go there.
• Keel Hauled - Imagine being tied to a rope and dragged underneath the ship. That’s keel hauling. In other words, you were just owned.
• Mutineer - Someone who disagrees with their captain and assists in the forceful removal of said captain. Many would call this betrayal. It’s definitely an insult.
• Pieces of Eight -This was a currency used in Spain at one time. It’s used to refer to money.
• Privateer - These guys were pirates who worked for the government. Real pirates think of them like scabs or narcs. They’re sell outs.

Pirate Phrases

• Another Squid, Another Pirate - This is the pirate version of “another day, another dollar.”
• Eat my Peg Leg - Do I need to explain this one?
• Lootin’ and Pillagin’ - Just another day in the life of a pirate.
• Swab the Deck - Essentially, this means leave me out of it.
• Walk the Plank - Telling someone they walked the plank is like saying they screwed up big time. Telling someone to walk the plank is like telling them to go to hell.
• Yo Ho Ho and a Bottle of Rum - A refrain from a classic pirate song.

How to Celebrate

This Friday, I encourage to you Twitter, instant message, chat, email, and generally talk like a pirate! Feel free to pester me with pirate-speak all day. I’m sandielaw on Twitter and Gmail.

I am going to wear my pirate-y scarf (it’s the one with jolly rogers all over it) on Friday. I’ll speak in “pirate” when conversing with everyone I come into contact with (except customers…cause they don’t have much of a sense of humor). After annoying everyone I know all day, I’m going to drink rum and watch pirate movies.

Among the many cool things being done on Friday, this is my favorite: Operation Care Packages (a volunteer group dedicated to making sure US soldiers deployed overseas get mail from home) suggests throwing a party to collect booty for overseas care packages. Check out their site if you’re interested.

What are you going to do? I’d love to hear about it and see any pictures and/or video of your celebration!

This is real news and not a joke, I swear. Rock Band 2 comes out on September 14. I’ll be picking it up that day and will be playing it that night. I promise I’ll report on how fantastic it is the next day.

Hollywood Insider reports that albums by the Foo Fighters, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Jane’s Addiction, Megadeth, and Stevie Ray Vaughn. Plus, there’s supposed to be a specially compiled No Doubt Best of collection. Not all of this will be available right away, but there are plans for 500 tracks by year’s end.

I’m excited about the new album announcements as well as the promised tracks I listed earlier. Now, they just need to include more punk stuff.

Oh, there’s also a new opening track. Check it out on the Hollywood Insider website.

For more on my obsession with Rock Band, check out these posts:

• Rock Band Roadies
• Rock Band 2 will Rock Your World!
• Band Geeks Grow Up

If you’ve read this blog at all, you know I love Rock Band and how much I’m looking forward to Rock Band 2.

Now I hear that Harmonix Music Systems has released a new expansion pack for Rock Band called the Roadie Expansion Pack. In addition to the four players that can play in Rock Band, the expansion lets two more people play as roadies. The roadies can use a spotlight, spare mic, and security mace.

The spotlight has to be pointed at the right person during solos. There are apparently light sensors that need to be attached to the instruments and the microphone in order for the system to detect whether the spotlight is being used correctly.

The spare mic has to replace a dead mic for the vocalist within a certain time frame or the band loses points. That’s the one that sounds like the least fun to me.

The security mace is used to keep rowdy fans at bay. The roadie has to push the button on the mace as fans climb up on stage. This actually seems cool. I love it when the fans sing along as we’re playing. Having them rush the stage would be really fun.

After songs, the roadie has to unplug the instruments in a set amount of time.

All in all, the roadie options are great if your circle of friends is too big for a single band and/or some of them don’t have the rhythm to play along. MonkeyBoy would likely enjoy being a roadie. He’d be able to play for real instead of just playing along with an unplugged guitar or dancing around. I’m sure he’ll still want to just dance around sometimes, but this is a nice option. As it stands, he can’t keep up long enough for the band to finish a song.

I laughed out loud when I read this quote by Harmonix CEO Alex Rigopulos:

I can’t imagine anyone who plays Rock Band would have more than five friends, so we should be covered for a while.

The Roadie Expansion retails for $59.99 and is available now. I don’t have it yet, but I suspect it’ll be coming home soon.

If you’ve tried it, let me know how it plays.

Do you watch Stargate Atlantis? I do. It isn’t my favorite show. I think you all know what my favorite show is. But I like Stargate Atlantis. It’s a good show.

However, it’s been cancelled.

Garth Franklin reports for Dark Horizons:

“Stargate Atlantis” will conclude its run on Sci Fi Channel after the current, fifth season ends next January according to MultiChannel News.

The network has however greenlit a two-hour TV movie to run after that and say the show will live on as a network franchise.

The untitled Atlantis movie will air on the Sci-Fi Channel sometime next year and then be released to DVD.

I can’t say I’m broken hearted. I’m a little tired of the Wraith and Replicators. While Rodney McKay has grown on me, I’m frustrated that the new doctor (whose name I can’t recall and am far too lazy to look up) has a crush on McKay rather than Ronin. I do like Woolsey now that he’s in command of Atlantis, but I’m frustrated by the frequent reappearances of Dr. Weir.

Darren Sumner at Gateworld reports that a new Stargate tv show will be gracing our screens in 2009.

The Stargate franchise blazes forward into new territory with Stargate Universe, a brand new television series from the creators of Stargate SG-1 and Stargate Atlantis. The SCI FI Channel announced today that it has picked up the new series for 2009.

The show will begin production early next year, and premiere in the summer with a 2-hour movie.

“SCI FI has enjoyed tremendous success with Stargate SG-1 and Stargate Atlantis and we’re proud to be the home of the new Stargate Universe,” Mark Stern, Executive Vice President, Original Programming for SCI FI said. “Universe will continue the Stargate legacy of vibrant storylines and compelling adventures, but will re-invent the format in a whole new way.”

Universe will attempt to appeal to a broader audience, drawing new viewers into the Stargate world. The show will be “a little more character-based, a little less rooted in a sci-fi mythology,” co-creator Brad Wright told GateWorld. “It really does come down to characters and stories that are engaging, and that people want to see — that they feel like they haven’t seen before.”

Part of the new focus is a deliberate attempt to bring in younger viewers to watch Stargate Universe. “This is an opportunity to reinvent this franchise and make it relevant to a new generation,” SCI FI president Dave Howe told The Hollywood Reporter. “We really don’t want to be more of the same. It’s going to build clearly off the existing franchise but with a cast that gives it a younger vibe.”

Stargate Universe is set on board a massive Ancient ship called the Destiny, millions of years older than even the city of Atlantis (story). The Ancients launched the automated ship millions of years ago to seed Stargates throughout many galaxies, with a second ship planned to follow it up and explore those planets. But they got busy with ascension, and never followed through on the plan.

Earth discovers that the Stargate’s mysterious ninth chevron can be utilized to gate directly to the Ancient ship, opening up literally the whole universe to explore. But the team will soon discover that they have no way back to Earth, and must ride the ship on its programmed course.

Here is how SCI FI describes the show:

After unlocking the mystery of the Stargate’s ninth chevron, a team of explorers travels to an unmanned starship called the Destiny, launched by The Ancients at the height of their civilization as a grand experiment set in motion, but never completed.

What starts as a simple reconnaissance turns into a never ending mission, as the Stargate Universe crew discovers the ship is unable to return to Earth, and they must now fend for themselves aboard the Destiny.

The crew will travel to the far reaches of the universe, connecting with each of the previously launched Stargates, thus fulfilling the Destiny’s original mission. Challenges will arise though as the ship comes into range of Stargates placed centuries ahead of the Destiny and the crew is unable to control the ship’s navigational schedule. If someone is left behind, there is no way to go back for them, adding to the drama of encountering new races, enemies and adventures.

Wright and Atlantis and Universe co-creator Robert C. Cooper will serve as show-runners, and are currently writing the premiere episode.

The news of the show’s pick-up comes immediately on the heels of the network’s announcement that Stargate Atlantis is ending after the current, fifth season, but will continue on to TV movies (story). But executive producer Brad Wright insists that the one decision did not cause the other.

“It’s not the case that anything is being pushed aside, any more than SG-1 is pushed aside,” Wright told GateWorld. “Shows have a life, and they live their life … There will always be a point where those people are disappointed. This is a way of preserving Atlantis going forward in a very strong way.”

Wright told GateWorld that Stargate Universe has been in the concept stage for two years, and that this year the time was right for SCI FI and MGM to move forward on the project together.

Stargate’s third live-action television series will shoot at The Bridge Studios in Vancouver, British Columbia. Stargate will take up new stage space on the lot, with the Atlantis and Stargate Command sets staying put on Stages 6 and 5 (respectively).

GateWorld is your number one source of news on Stargate Universe, so keep it locked right here as the show goes into production in the coming weeks!

My response to the news was a deep sigh. What now? Why cancel one show and create another?

It seems the Sci Fi Channel is up to its old nonsense again. SuperFreak and I often joke about the movies the Sci Fi Channel produces. The previews often look relatively entertianing, but the movies themselves are ridiculously bad. The programming on the Sci Fi Channel is either really good (Eureka, Battlestar Gallactica, and Dr. Who) or really bad (Saturday night movies, Ghost Hunters, and Flash Gordon).

I see no rhyme or reason to the cancelations or the selection of new shows. I wonder if they’ve got a monkey throwing darts at a bulletin board full of shows to see what stays and what goes.

At this point, I’m grateful my favorites are still on the air. I’m taking a very “live in the moment” attitude around these shows. I’m enjoying what I have while I have it…trying not to worry too much about the future.

What do you think of the Sci Fi Channel’s lineup?