Rantings of a Nerd

I may be just starved for good television, but the show seems to be finding its voice. The pilot suffered much from trying to explain everything, the second show was just not all that interesting, but by the 3rd, things seems to be happening.

The story was a nice twist. I wonder if they are changing directors for each show? I suppose I should look at the credits. That may explain some of the changes. There were Star Trek TNG episodes that were better than others. It had a a lot to do with the director.

Anyway, the 3rd episode was an enjoyable hour of television. Oh, it was in High Def too. That never hurts.

This is a test of blogger for word.  This may make it much easier for me to post.  I think I will like this if it works.

I would be surprised if they had sent me an email explaining what they did wrong. I won't hold my breath. At least it is working for now.

ThinkGeek :: Monty Python Killer Rabbit Plush

My cube is full of enough stuff, but this is tempting to add to the mess.

Jonathan Coulton

Since Jonathan quit his job and is doing his music full time he has taken it upon himself to do a thing a week. So far, he has two songs in two weeks.

If I could achieve this with my writing doing a thing a month I would never have to work at anything else again.

Give him a listen.

Still on temporary service... don't have 2 hours to waste on the phone today. I will be quite unhappy if it stops working again tomorrow.

I am not convinced that this show was actually science fiction, but it was at least interesting with good characters. The previews warn that it is not what you think.

I have no idea that that means. I would assume that it was an alien invasion using a hurricane as its disguise. However there were no UFOs. In fact nothing creepy that is out of the water.

With hundreds of people missing the small town is quarantined. The Sheriff seems to be involved in whatever sinister is going on. The ex's dislike each other, the brother in law is paranoid.

Oh, I forgot, It is in HD. The language looked to be well crafted so there were no inappropriate words like fart or mitts.

I have my suspicions that this may be some manner of supernatural show. Perhaps angels or demons. Now that would be a twist.

I will give this a few more episodes. In fact, I may give it a season.

The sets were awesome, the acting was good, and the special effects were acceptable.

local6.com - News - Mysterious 'Ball Of Fire' Seen In Fla. Skies

So here is where the UFOs are. Covered up by local news. So why didn't someone get a picture. Surely there was a camera phone nearby.

A joke email got me thinking with this line:

Have you noticed since everyone has a camcorder these days no one
talks about seeing UFOs like they use to?

In the 70s everyone had a story about a UFO they had seen. I know someone who had a great story about seeing a UFO hovering over a power plant. Her car lost power and she had to sit there and watch it.

So that was just one. I remember seeing what I know know was a weather balloon in 1976. Just a big silver disc hovering a few thousand feet up. Being a kid I wandered off after a while.

So with all this in mind, where are the UFOs today? Were all the "sightings" in the 70s and 80s actually US Air Force test planes?

I would think with all the digital cameras and camcorders that we should have UFO video and pictures of entire families of Big Foot. So what about Nessie? Now all of this will fall apart the second the Greys walk out of their landing craft in downtown New Orleans offering help to shore of the levies before the next hurricane.

Now will the greys chose to contact Fox or CNN first. I would be on Bloomberg Television and then all of the other news outlets will deny that authenticity of the video.

I don't have another 2 hours to devote to sitting on the phone so I will just have to be hopeful that Tivo customer service will do as they promised and restore the lifetime service I paid for and send me an email explaining why this happened.

LiftPort Group

These guys have recevied cleareance from the FAA to start some testing. I have to admit that this is just the start, but I am cheering for these guys.

I am not sure which one has a better chance of succeeding, the Space Elevator or the Fair Tax, but why not work both. Once we have a cheap way to lift stuff off this rock we can find new a neat ways to use the wealth a fair and equitable tax system will allow to be be built.

After 1.5 hours on the phone I have been given temporary service until the 23rd. I should connect in 2 hours and it will update. They have no idea why my account with lifetime service is closed.

I liken it to the gas station coming and siphoning gas out of your car and leaving your stranded on the side of the road. Then saying, "Oh, yeah, you did pay for that. Sorry." Then driving off with your gas.

I paid for a service. Paid dearly for it in fact. I then expected them to get out of the way.

I asked for an email response from a supervisor explaining how this happened. It is not just inconvenient. I have lost programming that I trusted the Tivo to record. Had the power gone out of the little Linux box crashed and needed rebooting, I can live with that. That is the nature of computing, sometimes hardware fails.

The fact that the company itself seemed to get in way of the service working as required is disturbing to me.

I Received a 'TiVo Service Account Closed' Message on My DVR (Message #68)

As if this posting, I have been on hold for more than an hour with Tivo support and have yet to speak to a human being. I find it disturbing to get an account close message on a Tivo with lifetime service. They have been giving out a message about forcing a connection is you have just activated your service and a getting a message saying it is not activated. I activated this one more than a year ago...

Not a happy customer right now.

I wanted this show to be good. I mean I really wanted this show to be good. I will say the jury is out. I will do my best to avoid spoilers, but the truth is, you probably won't care.

For starters, the show is in HDTV. Now that is a big plus for me, and I have been know to watch documentaries about Antarctica just because they are on HD.

So the show has Brent Spiner with Grey hair and an attitude. I will give that a plus as well. I have always liked Brent, Unfortunately I was reminded that I was watching a network television show when his character uttered the line, "They don't give a fart about you" and later said, "Keep your mitts off of her until this is over."

Fart, mitts. Come one. How about writing the dialog so you don't have to reveal that you are suffering from burdensome FCC regulations and network Standards and Practices. Not to get on a rant here, but you can show a severed hand and blood everywhere, but the word Fuck is over the line. Sad, just sad.

The Dwarf mathematical genius with a gabling problem and a love of strippers is great. If not a little formulaic, but still great.

I wanted to like Carla Gugino's character. She had the most depth of any of the characters but came across as flat as all the others in the end. The mysterious past that drove her to be a "worst case scenario" expert is so contrived I thought I was watching a star trek time travel episode.

There it goes... I had to bring up star trek. I will leave that alone for now.

Back to the cast... Charles S. Dutton actually won and Emmy for his role on The Practice. I know he is a good actor. Why did he miss his lines so many times. His acting looked like something from a C movie. Step 1, 2, line, step, line, long pause, line, step. It was actually a distraction. Maybe he was rushed to the set and had never seen the script. I am hoping. That was it, but the director should have never let those scenes get to print.


There were things I loved about this show. I love the fact that the Aliens may not have bothered to travel here, they may just be changing us into them. That is a cool thought. Very "out of the box" thinking for television.

I have this horrible feeling though that the inspiration for this show is over with that one great idea.

I will have to admit that I am putting this show up against Battlestar Galactica on Sci Fi and that is not a fair comparison for any show.

Threshold is a good show for network Science Fiction. How they move on to handling the weekly alien sighting and if they manage to make the story arc over a season or if it becomes 20 disjointed episodes will be the death or life for this series.

If it does not grow, we will know that Bragga was the cause of Enterprises demise and not the network. The characters have a chance to grow and expand, but I am not hopeful. I will give this a few episodes to see if it is worth the space on my DVR.

Entertainment: People Article | Reuters.com

When you hear on the radio that Richard Hatch is in trouble with the IRS and you think, "How could Tom Zarik be in trouble with the IRS."

If you have no idea what I am talking about, then you are not an uber nerd. Pat yourself on the back for having a life.

Richard Hatch is an actor who played Apollo in the Original Battlestar Galactica, and he is now Playing the Terrorist/Freedom Fighter/politician in the new Battlestar Galactica.