Changing The Name

Last night, I clicked a button, and transfered Worlds In A Grain of Sand to a new address, where you're reading now. I did this for a couple of reasons, and while it will likely take a little while to get the traffic that I enjoyed on the prior site to get back to normal, I think this change will be a positive one. A little while ago, I wrote an article/commentary for io9, which generated a number of e-mail and comments. While I was thrilled at the response, good and bad, what bothered me the most was two people, one who wrote to me directly and another on another website who made a couple of judgements of my argument simply on the basis of my email alone, with the screen name JediTrilobite.

JediTrilobite is a screen name that I've used for over a decade at this point: it started off in 1999 on the TheForce.net forums, combining a couple of my favorite interests. As I got more into Star Wars fandom and other places in the Internet, I continued the usage- I started up a blog and generally used it as a sort of online persona. That worked fine within the massive Star Wars community on the Internet, but over the past year, I've begun far more serious work online, writing for io9 and SF Signal, where my real name is far more important. Plus, my interest in Star Wars has largely waned from my fanboy days back in high school. I still like it, but not unadbashably so. These days, I'm far more interested in history and popular culture, and when writing about these things, I found that it'll be harder for people to take my arguments seriously if they can't get past a silly email/ online handle.

Only two people really commented on it. But, out of the 35,000 or so people who read that article, I can't help but wonder what others might have thought, either other fans or other people who might have otherwise looked at my article differently. Plus, I always operated under the assumption that in some circles, JediTrilobite generally was associated with Andrew Liptak. I don't know if that's as much of a healthy association professionally, and I've begun to take a bit more of a professional stance with how I appear online.

Thus, Worlds In A Grain of Sand now has the slightly less fun handle, but that's not necessarily a bad thing either. As I begin to write more and more, and hopefully more professionally, it's essential to tie my writing to me, as a sort of brand (god, that sounds horribly pretentious), rather than some random online persona.

Barre St. Market

I stopped by the small corner market on my street last night. It's not a place that I've visited much, despite it being just down the street from me, within an easy walk. I only went into it because while cooking dinner last night, I found that I didn't have any milk. Part of my meal was already cooking, so I grabbed my jacket and walked down to pick up something, and seeing that Shaw's was about a half-mile down the road, this would be quicker. I honestly don't know why I've never stopped by the place. I think I've been in there only once before. I think the perception of that street and the shop's size has just led me to think that there's not much there - the larger supermarkets in the area carry just about everything that I need, and as such, I tend to drive right past this place. When I walked in last night, I wasn't necessarily expecting much. I picked up my milk (Which I suspect, is currently sitting on the counter after using it last night. Crap.) went to the counter to pay, only to be told my the owner (who I think is Bangladeshi) politely told me that there was a ten-dollar minimum on debit purchases. Annoyed, I turned and looked around for something else to get so that I could complete my purchase and walk through the rain to my apartment to finish my cooking.

The store was immaculate. I hadn't so much as glanced around the room when I walked into the shop as I made a beeline for the milk. Now that I had a chance to look around the store a bit more, I saw that the shoulder-high shelves were laden with goods, and they were organized, their bright labels facing outwards, each one perched on the edge of the shelf with care. The floor was spotless, and the candy bars were behind a pane of glass, neatly arranged. Further browsing for a second revealed that this wasn't like a gas station convenience store, with the stock number of goods designed for a quick grab by a traveller looking to get in and out - there was a genuine selection here.

I grabbed a six-pack of beer, one of the things that sprung to mind that I knew I didn't have, and planned to pick up, and returned to the front, where I waited for the shop owner to sell a boy a candy bar while his dad browsed. The exchange was very homely, comforting and alien to me. In the past two years that I've lived in Montpelier, I don't think that I've exchanged more than a couple of words to the vendor, who looked about as interested in my day as I was in theirs. Similarly, I've never seen the same amount of devotion and attention to detail in the larger stores.

I'm not likely to shop there as much as I do the other stores. There's a reason why I'll make the drive over to Berlin or down the street to one of the larger stores - they have a larger selection for what I generally buy, and probably a bit cheaper. When I go shopping, I tend to go cheap, and get everything at once. But having gone down to this small street market, I'm far more inclined to stop in more. I like the feeling and ambience with the place. It is far more welcoming and interesting. Not to mention closer.

This Is My Bookshelf

I bought a new bookshelf today to help accomodate the vast overflow of books that I've accumulated during the past year and a half at my apartment. Since I've moved in, I've aquired a couple hundred new books in all numbers of genres. I had a number of piles, then towers of books springing up in very strange places all over my apartment, and the time was needed to find them a new home. A trip to Staples later, and I found such a home, a five-shelf, seven foot tall tower bookshelf. After a little construction, it was up and running, and a couple hours later, it became home to all of my history, biography, geek, science and space books, all now proudly on display. The piles are now gone, and the remaining shelves have been freed up a little, so I'm not too afraid of them bursting apart any more under the stress of overburdened shelves.

I love books. I can't say why or how, really, but looking at my new shelf, now neatly organized by genre, then by author and title, I've found myself sitting and letting my eyes wander across the titles and the brightly coloured spines. There's one about the 82nd Airborne in Normandy, the British Military during the Victorian era, the Spitfire aircraft, the Triangle Shirtwaist factory fire, the Paris 1919 peace conference, Kit Carson, the origins of the US Navy, Smallpox, comic comic books, Isaac Asimov, Roy Chapman Andrews, Apollo 13, Dwight Eisenhower, Salt, the Falklands and on and on. At my fingertips is a thousand journeys, stories and personalities, bound together with some paper, glue and ink, almost beckoning me to discover something new.

I suppose that there is a pretentious nature to this display, and I'm okay with that. Some people deck out their cars with the finest of accessories or toys or mud, while others display their degrees on the wall. I guess I want to demonstrate that I'm well read, versed in a number of different fields, eras of history, people, concepts or opinions, while still realizing that I haven't read all of these. My own journey is one of learning, and looking at this shelf, I can see that there's still a lot of distance to go there.

My main concern right now is that after all of the books have been settled in their proper place, shifted back and forth, there's no more space left for the inevitable next couple hundred books that will be coming through the door to join them.

Why We Write

That's a bit of a bad pun but while talking with someone earlier today, I realized just how much I write. When I was in high school, I wanted to be a science fiction writer; I penned a number of really bad short stories, and submitted several of them to publishers, in hopes that I would become the next Isaac Asimov. Unsurprisingly, that never happened, although it's still a hope kicking around in the back of my head that someday, I'll be able to publish a science fiction story somewhere.

In college, I began to maintain a blog, which is what this has ended up being. I've culled a lot of the older entries, over the past couple of years, I've noticed that I've begun to refine my writing style, and the topics that I write about. This blog, which was originally more of a personal project, has gone towards something that is more analytical, rather than personal. This is something that I've noticed change over the past couple of years, influenced by several people whom I've come into contact with socially and through school.

I've begun to write again for my music blog, Carry You Away, something that I had backed off from because of problems that I had with the music industry, but also the fans of the music that I posted up. Writing there turned from a personal pleasure towards something that was more along the lines of regurgitating press releases that I received from publicists, pushing things on me that I had no interest in writing about, and over the past couple of weeks, while reviewing several albums from bands that I did like, I remembered just how much I enjoyed doing this, and how I was able to help them.

Another reason why I pulled back from CYA was my recent addition to the staff of io9 as their 'Research Fellow', which I have been enjoying immensely. There, I've written a number of articles about subjects that I really enjoyed: What a Stormtrooper Is Made Of , Stalking NASA, Trilobites: The Greatest Survivors in Earth's History, The History (and Future) of Commercial Space Flight, Angels and Aliens Meet on Your February Bookshelf, Nine SciFi Books that Deserve to be Films, Tragedy for NASA's Climate Science Satellite Program and China Lands on the Moon - Sort of, with more to come. This site has proven to be a fantastic outlet for some of my interests, such as space exploration, science fiction and history. Some of my articles have received tens of thousands of hits, with hundreds of comments, which is both facinating and gratifying.

Looking over these places, I've wondered why I like to write - it's a lot more than I generally would have expected, and I suspect that it's a bit more than the average person. Coupled with my master's work with my Military History degree, there's certainly a lot there. I like to tell people about things. I guess blogging is one of the natural extensions of how I can do this, because I've never been the most comfortable around people, and it takes me a little while to really warm up to people, with a few very rare exceptions. Writing, I've found, is a way for me to get ideas down on paper (virtual or otherwise), in a logical fashion, and is a means for me to really examine things, for all their flaws, whether it is looking at a new album, a book, news, history or any other random idea that I've got bouncing around. In a way, it's a form of teaching, I guess, which is something that I would really like to do, especially in the academic history fields, which is what I'm mainly striving towards for my Master's. Already, I'm beginning to start thinking about my thesis, as well as extended work on the Norwich University D-Day paper that I did for my Senior thesis as an undergrad, not to mention my Byron Clark paper, which deals with local history during the progressive era.

It's fun to tell people about new things, and I like to think that I can help open people's minds, turn them to new things or see things in a different light than they had before.Thinking back to my conversation earlier today, I do write a lot. I guess it just comes naturally.

Paper Ballots

Why on earth doesn't everyone else utilize these? I just voted in Montpelier - No lines at all at 8 am - and used a paper ballot. Simple, one sheet, fill in the dots for your choice.

Not mine, but what I used

I'm watching NPR, Twitter and the New York Times and I'm seeing that there's massive problems with a lot of the new fangled technology for voting, and I have to wonder - why doesn't the rest of the country use a standardized ballot that is most likely cheaper and simpler to use, not to mention a hard copy record of what you just voted for? There's been a lot of talk about voter confusion as things change, but honestly? It seems like far too much work and added complexity with these things.

Technology can just plain suck.

Introduction to Fantasy

Over the past couple of years, I've done a lot of thinking about how I've reached the point to where I am today, how I obtained the interests and passions that I have now. I'm a geek, and I've been one for a long time, but I've never really questioned or considered just how I've gotten to this point until recently. Those who know me know that I'm a huge fan of Science Fiction and Fantasy - books, films, comics, TV shows, etc. Largely, I attribute this to being taken to a screening of A New Hope in 1997 when the series was re-released to theaters. Watching the film at that age really had a huge impact on me and my imagination, and it's not too mellow dramatic to say that it was a life changing experience.

But thinking back, I've come to realize that I've been exposed to the genre much earlier, but I could never really track down just how or what I had been reading or listening to. In elementary school, I largely read the Hardy Boys or other mysteries - I wanted to be a detective for the longest time that I could remember.

It hit me a couple months ago while at home - Merlin and the Dragons. I've become very convinced that this was one of the first introductions that I had to the genre. When I was in elementary school, my mother worked as a secretary for the principle and would drive me and my siblings into school every morning. I can't remember when exactly when I listened to it, but it was most likely around '92-'95 or so.

The story opens with a young King Arthur, who is having trouble sleeping. Walking around, he comes across Merlin, who tells him a story about a young boy in a village who was an orphan, booksmart and outcast from the rest of the children in the village. During the story, he has dreams and makes some predictions about the future. The king, Martigan, orders a tower to be built, and when it's completed, it is destroyed, only to be rebuilt and destroyed again. The boy dreamed of two dragon eggs under the tower that hatch into dragons, and they battle in the skies over the tower and the village.

This story is a really good one, as a story on its own. It has a number of themes - predicting the future and destiny, archetypes of purely evil and purely good characters, all while tying into the Arthurian legends nicely. It's a far different story in tone from the Disney Cartoon that I remember watching from the same time - this has some wholly dark elements to it, and some elegant storytelling that really sets this apart for me.

Listening to the audio book at that age, the narrator captured my imagination with talk of evil kings, dragons and mythology. I remember paticularly vivid imagry associated with this story, and listening to it now, it is bringing back a flood of memories that I'd largely forgotten. I'm getting chills while listening to this, remembering this story after such a long time.

Genius!

I'm an unabashed fan of Apple and most of their products. I own an iPod (I've gone through several) and use iTunes compulsively at work and at home. I listen to a lot of music - over the past year, since I started working on my music blog, I've come across a lot of music and my tastes in music has spread to a number of genres that I might not have ordinarily gone to. Apple last week unveiled iTunes 8, the latest edition of the program, which seems to have caught up with the user-generated content phase with the internet, chiefly through the addition of the latest addition to the program, Genius. The program takes the music that is in your music library and compares it to the rest of the music online, other users preferences and the popularity of other songs. From there, it makes recommendations and with the push of a button, can create custom playlists based on certain attributes of the selected song, and provide you with a playlist of similar songs.

It's neat in theory, and I'm guessing it works pretty well, but while I like the push-button option to create a playlist, I'm not terribly thrilled with iTunes taking my personal information and making personal recommendations based upon it. Granted, it's something that I've come to terms with when it comes to sites such as Amazon.com, and you can turn off the sidebar, which I was initially afraid was a permenant fixture to the main window.

My main problem right now is that the music that's on my computer right now is limited. I only have a hundred or so songs at any given time on this computer, while the good stuff is on my home desktop, which isn't connected to the internet. Unfortunately, it'll probably give my computer a stroke if I try and install it, but we'll see.

This comes at a time when the nano and other iPods have been re-designed a bit, per the usual Apple methods, putting mine out of date, and making the newer ones much more desirable. I'm currently contemplating upgrading to an iTouch, simply because you can do more with it - including surfing the internet and the like. iPhones, while they work in Vermont, can't be purchased because of something with the networks they run on. I guess we'll see. The prices have come down a little, and they're not terribly out of reach for me any more. I guess we'll see.

Essential Websites

Throughout my day, there's a variety of websites that I check out religiously, or at the very least, pretty often, either for amusement or general reference. Some just once a day to once a week or so for news and what have you, others more often as they're updated throughout the day. The Hype Machine

This site is a fun one. I've been going to it for over a year now, and have my own blog listed on it. The Hype Machine is a godsend for music fans - it tracks and posts content on its front page from thousands of music blogs around the world. Oftentimes, you can find obscure covers, duets, through to the current popular songs. The music that filters through tends to be more towards the indie-rock / rock spectrum, but everything is represented at some point.

The New York Times

Print newspapers are the way to go. Because I don't subscribe because of expense and the vast number of newspapers that would build up quickly at my apartment, I check in at the NYT a couple of times a day. They update throughout the day, and it's generally a good place to get news. I also am a big fan of their arts section, and I generally agree with their movie reviews.

Wired Magazine

Wired is a fun magazine to page through, and their website is one that I've just added to my list of places to visit and check up on, because it gets a lot of fantastic interviews, reviews and news of all sorts.

Flickr

When it comes to pictures, you can't get better than flickr. It's easy to use, very open and versitile. You can tag pictures with locations, search based on just about anything, create profiles and keep an eye on people that you know, as well as keep an eye on pictures that catch your eye by marking them as favorites.

Amazon.com

Actually, I prefer independent bookstores over all others. BUT, when it comes to the internet, Amazon.com is a powerhouse of buying things. Customer reviews, cover images, a very, very good used section and just about everything that you'd ever want is literally at your fingertips when it comes to books, movies and music (that's my use of it anyway). I got a text book for a penny once. And, they're fast.

io9

I came across this site several months ago, and check it religously. Interesting articles, lots of up-to-date information on all sorts of interesting geek things when it comes to books, movies, music and culture. Commentators are screened out, so there's none of this IMDB bullshit that goes on with their forums. I've come across so many interesting things here, this is a fantastic place to visit.

Facebook

Okay, I'm a bit of a facebook junkie. I've found it to be a very good way to keep in touch with a lot of people, former classmates, 501st members from around the globe, camp friends, things like that, not to mention a fun way to see what people are up to. Granted, there's always the concern about security and how much information you should be putting up on the internet, but if you're careful (and I think this is a far better place than myspace), you'll be fine.

Word Press

I used blogger for years, and was convinced to come over to do Wordpress from a couple of friends recently. Overall, I like it far better. Easier to use and manage, much better looking and all around more impressive than my prior platform. Manages comments really well, allows you to host your own pictures, allows for rather seamless intigration of media into posts. My only complaint is that the post section is too narrow.

Intellicast

This comes as habit from my dad, but I've always found Intellicast to be the best source for weather forecasting, aside from Eye in the Sky, on NPR. I generally check in when I'm planning something outside.

SciFi

The SciFi channel's website. It's a good source for information about their programs, but I mainly go there for their SciFiWire, which has 10 or so big stories from the genre's news over the day, as well as some interviews and other content. Plus, they have SciFi's shows online.

Youtube

Youtube is addicting. There's too much crap, too many kids with guitars pretending that they can sing, but oh, the possibilities for amusement, catching news broadcasts or speeches, TV clips or entire episodes, etc, are endless.

Wikipedia

As an academic-wannabe, I can't stand Wikipedia. There's far too much potential for someone to mess with information, and I've seen too many students liberally copying passages from it to trust or really like its influence on how information is gathered - people really need to learn to go to regular sources, like books. Remember those?

However, Wikipedia is a really, really handy reference for quick information. Like Cape Verde, halite, Valeriy Polyakov, or anything else you want to know. Superficial information? Great! More detailed stuff - not so much, although often, it'll tell you where to find it. And, despite the obvious drawbacks of user-uploadead information, it's usually correct stuff that goes up, or at least, corrected quickly.

iTunes

Okay, not a website really, but as a platform for listening to music, it's wonderful. There's a lot that I listen to, and it's one of the first things that I fire up in the morning. Plus, it's a great way to listen to news, I've found, as I subscribe to a number of podcasts, such as the BBC, NPR, NYTimes and a couple others to listen to the news while I work.

Google/Gmail/Calendar/Maps/Everything else

And what would this list be without Google and gmail? GMail is fantastic, great e-mail provider, although google can be really scary at times, especially when it comes to censoring information in China or something like that, it's the best way to find things online. Period.

And yes, I do work. Checking all of these takes about 15-20 minutes over the entire day, usually during a break. Or running in the background.

Worlds in A Grain of Sand's New Home

For the past couple of years, I've hosted this blog on blogger.com. Recently, I've been wanting to do more with my blogging, and a couple friends of mine, notably Noel Green, recommended that I try Word Press. Looking over the platform over the past couple of weeks, I've found that I can transfer all my posts over here, and that the interface is a lot easier to use, which I like, plus, it looks better. While all of the original posts (900 +) are on here, some of the links might not work, or might lead back to the original blog site, which I'll be keeping around.

Currently, the tags only go through last summer. I'm planning on updating them over time, but at this point, it's not a priority. I'm going to be updating the links over the next couple of days. Wordpress has a feature to convert all the catagories into tags. I love this engine.

TV Stuff

Some random TV news that I've come across lately. Don Davis passed away over the weekend, which came as a very big surprise to me. Davis was the actor behind one of my favorite SG-1 characters, Gen. Hammond, who was in charge of Stargate command for most of seven seasons before he retired. He was also in a couple of other shows, Supernatural, The Dead Zone, the West Wing, Andromeda, Star Gate Atlantis, and numerous other features. Davis brought a grace and intensity to Hammond, who started off as a very strong character, who really became more than a series extra. He shall be missed.

Chris Noth is leaving Law and Order: Chriminal Intent. Personally, I'm pretty happy about this, because I've always felt that his character, Logan, didn't hold a candle to Detective Goren, although he did bring an interesting take to his episodes, which I did like. Now, his replacement should be interesting: Jeff Goldblum, who's already played a crazy detective in the show Raines, which I loved. Unfortunately, the crazy cop sees dead people thing isn't the most original, and it was canceled. Goldblum is the perfect choice for this show, and hopefully, we'll see some crossover episodes with him and Det. Goren. THAT should be interesting to watch.

And, this BBC person says that TV Drama has replaced literature:

Television drama had supplanted the novel, she said, as the "narrative of our times that gives our lives meaning and shape".

I think that to some extent, that's true, but I don't think that I would ever classify TV Drama as something that's replaced books. It's a very scary thought. I'm split when it comes to this - I do enjoy a number of things on TV, it's a guilty pleasure of mine - the BBC especially, with Dr. Who and Life on Mars, but also some shows in the US like Law and Order, House MD, Pushing Daisies, among others. They're interesting, makes you think, but there's also a lot on TV that is complete drivel and shallow. Even these dramas aren't up to the quality of a good book.

Random Things

A couple of things that I've been pondering/observing today while at work and from clicking through channels on TV a little while ago...

- I can't stand Victor Davis Hanson. This is partially because I've been party to a number of rants from some of my co-workers, but now sitting down and reading Carnage & Culture has really just clinched it for me. Item 1 - he claims that he's not trying to be Euro centric: "I am not interested here in whether European military culture is morally superior to, or far more wretched than, that of the non-West." (Victor Davis Hanson, Carnage and Culture, New York, NY: Anchor Books, 2001: 6). But then he turns around and does just that:

- "No other culture but the west could have brought such discipline, morale, and sheer technological expertise to the art of killing than did the Europeans at the insanity of Verdun." (9) - "By the same token, there was little chance that the American government in the darkest days of December 1941 - Britain on the ropes, the Nazis outside of Moscow, the Japanese in the air over Hawaii- would have ordered thousands of its own naval pilots to crash themselves into Admiral Yamamoto's vast carrier fleet or commanded B-17s to plunge into German oil refineries" (9) "Militarily, the uniforms of the world's armies on both sides of the modern battle line are now almost identical - Western Khakis, camouflage, and boots are worn when Iraqis fight Iranians or Somalians battle Ethiopians. Companies, brigades, and divisions - the successors to Roman military practice- are the global standards of military organization." (13) - "Natural determinist are to be congratulated in their efforts for the most part to dismiss genes. Europeans were not by any means naturally smarter than Asians, Africans, or the natives of the New World. They were not genetically dumber either- as Jared Diamond, the purportedly natural determinist, has unfortunately hinted at. In an especially disturbing reference to racial intelligence, Diamond argues for the genetic inferiority of Western brains." (15)

And all that's within the first twenty or so pages of this book. It this just me, or is he really going back on things? The reference to December places western forces on a huge moral pillar, as does his annoyance at the suggestion that there might be genetic differences that don't favor the west. Diamond is an observer, and a damn good one at that - his arguments make a lot more sense. Ugh.

- The Democratic race seems to be down to an end. Sen. Obama, when the TV was on last, needed ten more delegates to win, and I have the nagging suspicion that Clinton will throw in the towel soon thereafter. It'll be nice to have one party that's not fighting with one another, bickering. My main problem, and some talking head on ABC put it into better words than I, has been that Sen. Clinton has been looking back on the past, at her experience and her husband's efforts in the White House, rather than focusing on the future, as Sen. Obama really has been doing. However, I think that the two of them would make a killer ticket.

- GM is planning on selling off the Hummer line. First of all, who is going to buy that now? Gas prices have led SUV sales to fall nearly 30%, while compact and more fuel efficient car sales are up 30%. Hm...

- The Discovery Channel is launching (small pun intended) a miniseries next Sunday called When We Left Earth. Damn, that looks absolutely fantastic. I know what I'll be doing while that's on. My interest in Space History has only increased recently, with a couple of recent reviews of Nebraska University Press's Outward Odyssey series and with a couple other books. It's a facinating subject, and from the looks of things (and from the producers), this looks to be an absolutely fantastic series. I'll probably review it when I see it.

- The world needs superheroes.

- From the finale of LOST:

- Jesus Christ is not a weapon. - Locke: Is he talking about what I think he's talking about? Ben: You measn time traveling bunnies? Then yes.

That ending? Liek whoa. When does season 5 start again?

Your mobile what?

So, I've aquired a new, small, metal/plastic/electronic thingy. I broke down and finally got a cell phone. It's pretty cool, and I think that I've figured out all the things that it does, but I'm sure that it'll surprise me with some things. This is really the first time that I've had a real mobile phone - aside from a TracPhone that was a piece of crap. If anything, it'll help me keep in touch with people whom I haven't heard from in a while.

Random Stuff

I have Heroes on DVD, a paycheck, the Takeski Kovacs Trilogy in Trade paperback, a cell phone on the way, a real job and a new friend. Life is finally good.

Weekend

Vermont experienced a couple of really strong storms last night. While driving to the bank to deposit my paycheck, NPR was interrupted by a weather warning saying that there was a tornado watch in pretty much all of Vermont. This is somewhat scary, because Vermont never gets tornadoes. I think that in the entire time that I've lived here, we've gotten one? Two at the most? They just don't happen here. This morning, I heard reports of inch and a half thick hail that fell in some places in North East New York, and worried about Camp Abnaki, because it's right up there in the islands. I've put out a message earlier today seeing what was happening, because someone said that a tornado touched down in the islands. Apparently Camp experienced some damages, and I'll most likely find out exactly what happened, as I'm headed up there tomorrow morning for something my dad's company is doing, to visit a couple of people at camp and to see my friend Blackwell, who's home for the week. Then off to see Grace Potter again in Burlington, which should be fun.

Batman and the Senate Judicial Committee

This is a pretty cool tidbit from CNN. One of Vermont's Senators, Patrick Leahy, D-Vermont, will have a small cameo role in the upcoming Batman movie, The Dark Knight Returns. Apparently, the senator, who's the chair of the Judicial Committee, is a big Batman fan, and will have a small speaking role.

Apparently, he'll share a scene with the two main stars of the film, Christian Bale and Heath Leger.
It's not the first time that Vermont's been involved with Batman. Scenes from Batman and Robin were supposed to be filmed in the Barre Granite Quarries, but that was scrapped due to expense. In addition, one of the best known writers for the series, Frank Miller, grew up in Central Vermont.
It'll be pretty cool to see Senator Leahy in the film. I wonder if it will raise any questions about his approach to the recent subpoenas against White House personnel. Maybe he should get a spotlight on the top of his office complex.

Revisions, Projects and Deadlines

It's one week to go before classes are finally over, and exactly one week before my Normandy paper is due to class. The amount of work that I've done on it since receiving the edits? Minimal. I didn't even start my english paper until about 12 hours before it was due, although that came together really quickly. My work ethic is sucking this week, I think senioritis kicked in becauseohgodintwoweeksi'mgoingtograduateandi'llbedonewithschoolfortheforseeablefuture. Gah. Part of me is very happy about this. The part isn't, because I genuinely enjoy learning and this sort of thing. I'm still thinking and planning on attending graduate school at some point, with the intention to teach or research history somewhere, because this is what I like doing. In the meantime, I have to actually find a job and you know, a place to live.I'm currently editing a paper for another member of my NU History Seminar, on the US Militia System and our school's founder, Alden Partridge. It's an interesting read, and we're hearing three more presentations later today. I need to type up a critique for this paper, and I think I've found some good things to discuss. After being rejected from Abnaki this year, I've started concentrating on full time jobs for the time being. I've applied to another book store with the intent on working there and Walden Books and getting some hours between them, which would be nice. I like Bear Pond Books, and have shopped there all my life. It's one of the independant bookstores in Montpelier, and has a very cool atmosphere to it. I've also gotten a called from the Green Mountain Club for an interview with them, which would be very, very cool. My outlook on the summer has improved dramatically. I've also learned that a new airline is about to start operating, something similar to Ryanair (a UK carrier), that has prices that are literally as low as they can get. On a good day, a round trip flight to Ohio will cost me under $40. Hopefully, this will help me and Sarah get together more often, as it's quite expensive and time consuming to drive from here to there. Also, Drive was cancelled yesterday. Once again, Fox torched a show because of lackluster ratings, although this one was probably cancelled for more reason than Firefly was. (Tim Minear was a producer for Firefly, and the creator of Drive). Poor Nathan Fillion can't get a break with his shows. Drive did have potential, but nowhere near Firefly's. It had an interesting premise, some interesting characters, but a very limited premise - While it would have been an interesting thing to see play out, but some of the characters were really irritating. Fox was behind this show, unlike with Firefly. There was a ton of ads for it, and really early ads for it - Fox wanted this to work - unfortunently, the viewers just weren't there - The show got about a 2.5/6 rating for the first episodes and was dragging 24, one of Fox's most popular shows, down. It's a pity, this year there were a bunch of cool shows that were cancelled. Andy Barker PI, Smith, Drive, Studio 60 (most likely), Black Donnellys, Daybreak, The Nine, among others. Hopefully, there'll be some of the good shows, such as Heroes, Raines, LOST, Supernatural and Veronica Mars, that will get another couple of seasons. Right, back to my editing...

Alive! And Angry. And Busy

So, still very annoyed about Camp and everything - Furious really, but I have my Normandy Project to distract me for the time being. Couple of recent developments:

- One of the alumni on my list is still alive. And I have a phone number for him. Thus, I am all but bouncing around at this news.

- Finished getting pictures of everyone scanned, and once I isolate the pictures, I'll include them in my presentation tomorrow.

- I'm presenting tomorrow and oh god, I'm not done with my presentation I've got people I still need to include in my paper and gaah.

- Just got the rest of my stuff for the Normandy trip. My flights from NH to London and back is now booked. My hostel in London is booked. Flights to and from London to Paris is now booked. Arrangements to meet people and staying with them have been made. And it's less than a month before the trip.

- Raines, the TV show, is awesome. As is The Zimmers, a band of 90 + year old English people, singing the Who's My Generation, seen here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqfFrCUrEbY

Randomness

I'm on spring break now - it really seemed to come quickly! Hopefully, I'll be getting a little work done with my D-Day project, at least with the background research and reading for the opening sections. After I get back, I'll have quite a bit to do with individual unit histories and things like that.

Other random things:

• The USPS will be celebrating the 30th anniversary of Star Wars by putting out a number of mailboxes that look like R2-D2. Looks fun, I'm sure that some of those will vanish to collectors. Theforce.net has some pictures.
  
• Kieth R.A. DaCandido, the hack who was assigned to the Serenity novelization is set to help degrade another favored fandom of mine, this time, the show Supernatural, which airs on the CW. I think that I'll be passing that when it hits shelves. the Serenity novelization was poorly written as it was, and I've got plenty of other things to read.
  
• My reading list for break: Finish Children of Men, Tempest, Good Omens, The Gunslinger, Iron Sunrise.
• Apparently, my current math teacher also taught my Uncle Kevin and Aunt Mary when they were in middle school in Bristol. Small world...

Edit: And UPS just arrived with a box of books for me, from Simon & Schulster, all hardcovers, all free. w00t!

New Currency

Found this article during the morning news scan: We're getting another $1 coin, starting next week. Interesting, because I hadn't heard a thing about it until now. Like the 50 quarter program, the US mint will be running through all the presidents, four per year.

The coin looks cool - and overall, coins make a lot more sense than dollar bills, mainly, because they last something like 30 times longer. Bills become tattered and torn, while coins just wear down a bit. England doesn't have a £1 note - they've got the pound, a thick coin about the size of a quarter. I loved that coin and still have a couple kicking around. Coins like thse also make a lot of sense for a lot of the automated things that we frequently use, such as vending machines, laundry, bus tickets, everything like that. I was a little disapointed that the previous dollar coin didn't pan out - I liked that one as well. The way that this is being approached though, might pull in more people to collect or use them. I guess we'll see.

Did you know?

Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis is the longest word in the english language, with 45 letters.