Tuesday, July 29, 2008

EARTHQUAKE!!

Yeah, people were all excited for a minute. One of my buddies called me at work, wanted to know if I knew anyone in Chino Hills.

So I called my son.

He said yes, he and his wife were just leaving the apartment when it hit. They stopped and turned on the TV, yup, there was an earthquake. So they picked up the ironing board that fell over and checked on the cats (the cats were a bit freaked out). Then they went to lunch.

Not to sound cynical, but I'm quite sure that every news station in the LA basin was searching for a liquor store with broken glass all over the floor. I'll watch the 10 o'clock news to see.

I wasn't even concerned enough to turn on CNN.

You see, a 5.4 is a nice little jolt, but it's not all that bad. Enough to rattle the dishes and knock over a few things, that's about it.

I know, we sound so calm about it.

I was in the Loma Prieta earthquake. Now that one was scary -- and it wasn't even the Big One!

Today, just another day in the life of a California kid...

Sunday, July 27, 2008

Frodo Lives

You know, the other day I was talking about Darkover.

It brought back memories of other favorite books, chief among them, The Lord of the Rings.

I can't count the number of times I've read and enjoyed The Hobbit and the trilogy of The Lord of the Rings. (Too bad I foolishly lent out The Two Towers from my set, now I need to find another copy or buy another set. Darn it all, and you wonder why I don't lend my books out!)

I was so excited and pleased with the LOTR movies. While some fans may criticize some of the characterizations and changes from the original book, the sweeping tale was very well done.

Let me say, Hollywood at its best. A rare thing.

Being a huge sci-fi/fantasy fan, I've seen some pretty bad movies made from some pretty darn good books. Somehow Hollywood manages to skew the book to fit the flavor of the month.

Yes, the LOTR movies did justice to the books.

Frodo lives. Immortalized in book and movie, Frodo will always be with us.

Saturday, July 26, 2008

The New X-Files Movie

Yes, blush, I'm a HUGE X-Files fan.

So my daughter and I went to see the new movie last night.

I enjoyed it, it was interesting. It could've been more complex, more wheels within wheels, but it was good. The ending left a few details hanging, but you know, that's the X-Files. Nothing is ever completely answered in real life and the X-Files has always reflected that.

Faith is a large component of the movie.

Fox WANTS to believe. And so does Scully, although she battles against it. Science vs Faith, which will win?

I'm not going to be a spoiler, but I would recommend it to all of my friends who are fans of the old show.

It could've been deeper, but it was good. Better than a lot of the pap the movie studios put out these days.

Wednesday, July 16, 2008

Darkover

I've been re-reading some of my Darkover novels, by Marion Zimmer Bradley.

Darkover was huge in the 70s.

A complex world, mistaken by Terrans as a feudal culture, Darkover is filled with angst, conflict, death and life. A telepathic society that has already had its Age of Chaos, Darkover chooses to remain independent of Terran technology.

I've really been enjoying re-reading my old friends.

I would recommend starting the series with Darkover Landfall and then working your way through them chronologically. Well, as much as you can, since the books are all loosely set on Darkover, but were written over a long period of time. So the "first" book was actually written much later than the "last" book of the series.

Darkover, highly recommended.

(Hey, you can do a search on the Amazon, just look to the right, I have an Amazon link available for your convenience.)

Saturday, July 12, 2008

Wish Upon A Hero

I've recently come across a wonderful website called Wish Upon A Hero, http://www.wishuponahero.com/.

Talk about a wonderful place.

It's all about fulfilling wishes, needs, wants for people.

It's a very simple concept. You post what you wish or want. People comment if they choose, donate if they choose, give helpful hints and often just plain sympathy for the situation. If they choose to donate, they can use PayPal, so their personal information remains private.

It's a neighbor helping neighbor kind of thing.

Just since I came upon it, I've seen people asking for such simple things as a sandwich and much larger things like groceries/grocery money after a power outage wiped out their food.

I'm pretty new, so I'm going to keep checking it out and reading the wishes and wants.

Wish Upon A Hero.

If only we didn't need such websites -- and thank God we have them!!