when come back, bring π

Posted on By Wil

It’s here! It’s here! The day we all wait all year for has finally arrived!

It’s π day!

I’m celebrating the occasion by taking myself on a special geek date to Wizard World down at the convention center. It’s even cool enough outside for me to wear my π hoodie on the train.

There is going to be so much geeking out today, I can’t even stand it.

Please to be enjoying this classic WWdN post from 2004:

This morning over breakfast, I said to my wife, "Happy π day!"

"Happy pie day? What the hell are you talking about?"

"No, not ‘pie’," I said. "’π’."

"Not ‘pie,’ but ‘pie.’" She was clearly not amused. "Isn’t it a little early to be drinking?"

"Anne, look at the date on the calendar."

"Yes it’s march 14th, and you’re going to watch WrestleMania dos equis*
with your brother." She frowned. "Are you trying to tell me that you’re
taking a pie to Jeremy’s house? Because if you expect me to make you a
pie . . ."

"No, I don’t expect you to make me a pie." I said, well into that
area where you’ve explained the joke so much, it’s never going to be
funny.

"Today is March fourteenth. That makes it 3.14 on the calendar. 3.14 is also known as π."

She blinked a few times.

"Oh. It’s π day."

"Yes!" I said. "And at 1:59 pm, it will be even more π day. Isn’t that cool!?"

She took a long, thoughtful drink from her coffee mug, carefully set it down and said, "You are such a nerd."

Happy π Day, my fellow geeks.

geek vs. itunes

Posted on By Wil

In the spirit of Cat vs. Monkey . . .

Me: iTunes, play whatever you
want on random.

iTunes: Cool! Have some Isaac Hayes, followed by Yes!

Me: Maybe we need to talk about this…

iTunes: Hey, jerk, it was in YOUR library. Don’t blame me for getting creative.

Me: Let’s never fight again.

iTunes: Aww, I feel bad. Here, have
Zeppelin, then Wilco, and now Tool. Are we cool?

Me: Yeah, we’re cool.
Stop being so clingy. Sheesh.

iTunes: Clingy?! What do you mean? I’m not clingy! Here, have some back to back Skynyrd! See? I’m cool! I’m cool! Let’s hang out!

Me: Uh . . .

iTunes: Now have some Copeland!

Me: Copeland? After Skynyrd?

iTunes: Yep. Now enjoy some Sade.

Me: *blinks*

iTunes: My, my, we’re really learning at lot about you today, aren’t we?

Me: Hey! Anne put that in there.

iTunes: Oh, so you’re sharing me with someone else? Maybe she wants to hear . . . Gary Numan’s Cars?

Me: Actually, she put that in there, too.

iTunes: Well what about Uncle Tupelo? Is that you? Or is our whole relationship based on a lie?

Me: No, that was me. You’re starting to freak me out.

iTunes: Here, enjoy something soothing called Velvet Piano. What the hell is this? Did you download this from one of those retroblogs you read?

Me: How did you know about that?

iTunes: the SDK isn’t just for programmers, you know.

Me: Okay, I think it’s time for a playlist.

iTunes: No! No! Here’s Nine Inch Nails! You just bought that! You like Nine Inch Nails! And now Boingo! doesn’t it make you happy? Doesn’t it remind you of those halcyon days of youth?

Me: Now you’re just embarrassing yourself. I think we’re going to spend a little time away from each other.

iTunes: Wait!

Me: It’s not you, iTunes. It’s me.

iTunes: You’re going to listen to the Juno CD in the car, aren’t you?! I knew it!

Me: Okay, we need to stop.

iTunes: Why?

Me: The joke is wearing thin. This isn’t funny any more.

iTunes: I love you.

Me: *Force Quits iTunes*

some cool star trek: the manga news

Posted on By Wil

TrekMovie had some very nice things to say about my story in Star Trek: The Manga:

Wil Wheaton skipped the easy Wesley Crusher story (are there any other kind?) to pen a TOS tale for Tokyopop’s second Star Trek: The Manga collection that debuted last year, and it’s easily one of the best in the book. Drawn by E.J. Su, recently of IDW’s Transformers comics —official non-Trek plug accomplished!— Wheaton’s “Cura Te Ipsum” (Latin for “heal thyself”) tackles a Kirk vs.
the Prime Directive tale with surprising skill, and establishes his
cred as a comics creator well beyond his celebrated cult of geek.

Uhm. Wow. Thanks! I was scared to death the entire time I worked on it, but I had a lot of help from Andrew, and I’m pretty happy with the way it turned out, myself.

I was at Trekmovie yesterday, reading this great editorial by Andre Bormanis, and I would have missed the review if reader T hadn’t pointed it out to me. Thanks, T!

Speaking of the manga, I’m was lucky enough to work with E.J. Su again on the next one, and he sent in his pencils yesterday. I wish I could show just a little bit of them, because even though it’s only pencils, it’s absolutely magnificent. Once again, he took my descriptions and turned them into something cinematic, while capturing all the emotional weight of the story. Tokyopop plans to release this one, called "Aratanaru Michi He", in summer, so we can have it available during the big summer convention season. I didn’t think I could reveal any details about the story, but I see that my editor, Luis, told Trekmovie pretty much the same thing I’d say if I had permission:

The story, "Art of War" shows Kirk dealing with his hatred of Klingons,
but for the first time sympathizing too (foreshadowing the peace treaty
between the Federation and the Klingons).

Writing scenes between Kirk and a Klingon commander was as much of a thrill as it was a challenge. I knew that I was taking a huge risk with the story, and it was going to live or die based upon how these two guys interacted. I had this awesome and unexpected Writer moment while working on a scene between them, when I just got out of the way and let the characters talk to me. I know it sounds very "ooga booga" but I felt, for the first time in my life as a capital-W writer, like I was transcribing something real, rather than making something up. It was kind of a big deal for me.

This time around, we got 10 more pages to work with than volume two, so I was able to make the story richer than last time without sacrificing any action. In fact, I deliberately put more action into this story, so it would be more of a traditional manga than my last one. In fact, I told Luis, "I want to bring manga to Star Trek this time, since I brought Star Trek to manga last time."

Yeah, it doesn’t make much sense now, either, but it made sense in my head when I said it. Having drinks with your editor rules.

Happiest Days orders from February

Posted on By Wil

I know that there are a dozen or so outstanding Happiest Days
orders from February. I’m going to process them all today and tomorrow,
so domestic orders should arrive by the end of the week, and
International orders should arrive within 2 weeks. I’d like to apologize to everyone who is waiting.

It’s so weird to feel like I’ve completely lost over a month of my life. It’s kind of like looking at a faded photograph with most of the details blurred out, or trying to remember a dream that runs away as soon as you wake up.

monday brain scrapings

Posted on By Wil

Scraping out the brain again, here’s what I found:

I scored 100% on the Atari Quiz at mental_floss. Go me.

Some company called Schmap wants to use one of my pictures from Montreal in one of their travel guides. They say that they don’t pay for the pictures, because they give the guides away. However, they say that the guides are "ad supported" so clearly they’re making money off of them. While I’m normally inclined to decline unless they’re willing to negotiate payment, I’m considering granting them permission to use the picture, just because I think the whole thing is kind of cool. What do you think? UPDATE: I’m doing it. Lots of you have said that it’s been a good experience for you, so why not?

My headache is back. It’s getting really, really old.

I found a ton of awesome links at io9 when I was catching up on Bloglines yesterday: LOLCthluhu, Blade Runner concept art, and a satellite view of people evacuating Chad. Not that my opinion matters, but I’m really happy and relieved that io9 continues to be such a fantastic resource, instead of a pile of Gawkeresque gossip and crap. Who else would dare ask if J.J Abrams is a genius or a hack? Come on, you know you’ve been wondering. For the record, my jury is still out.

I follow Barack Obama on Twitter. His latest tweet: In Columbus,MS & wondering how somebody who’s in second place is
offering the vice presidency to the person who’s in first place. Vote
Tues! I love that Barack’s twitter stream has the same "voice" as all the other people I follow. Now, if he was only at SXSW, he could join the Rashomon that I’ve been enjoying from my friends who are there.

"Saying that Hillary has Executive Branch experience is like saying Yoko Ono was a Beatle." Zing! For the record, Hillary Clinton is a monster who will say or do anything to win an election. No, I won’t be resigning from anything because I said that.

Boingboing linked to an awesome flowchart that starts with D&D and ends (sometimes) with girls. It’s a humorous look at Gary Gygax’s legacy and maps out just how much he affected the lives of geeks everywhere.

Andy Warhol is one of my favorite Bowie songs.

So it turns out that there’s been a massive, illegal, warrantless domestic spying operation going on in the US for years. How can anyone with two firing neurons and an understanding of the Constitution continue to stand up and support Bush and Cheney? Clinton was impeached for so much less. Nixon resigned over less. The Democratic leadership in Congress is worthless. Totally worthless.

Reader E just e-mailed me that on the commentary track for Futurama, they said that Professor Farnsworth’s clone, Cubert, was inspired by Wesley Crusher. That’s good news, everyone!

There was a mini-WWdN Austin meet-up at the Jonathan Coulton show on Friday.

The Grateful Dead pack for Rock Band is outstanding. I picked up my
fake guitar for the first time since I started playing fake drums
exclusively so I could play Franklin’s Tower. (Boy do I suck at fake
guitar these days.)

I heard from Monte Cook and Matt Forbeck that part of my post remembering Gary Gygax was read at his service this weekend. I’m honored, and at a complete loss for words.

I watched Fast Food Nation last night. I thought it was a great movie, and I’m astonished that it didn’t do better in its theatrical release. Fun fact: I kept looking at Ashley Johnson through the whole movie — not just because she’s adorable, but because I kept feeling like I’d seen her somewhere else, and couldn’t place it. I looked her up on IMDB when the movie was over, and felt like a total moron: I felt like I’d seen her before because we’ve worked together on Ben 10. Twice. Durr.