I want you to remember this face. This is the guy behind the guy behind the guy

Posted on By Wil

How about if I wait six weeks to call. I could tell her I found her number while I was cleaning out my wallet, I can’t remember where we met. I’ll ask her what she looks like and then I’ll ask her if we fucked. How about that? Would that be money?
    -Mike, Swingers

There aren’t any real developments on the Sci–Fi hosting front, and I only have one really great Fark Cliche left, which is why I haven’t written about it recently. Like I said before, I have to just let go of these things after a certain point, accept that it’s entirely out of my hands, and keep moving forward with everything else in my life.

But so many people sent me supportive e-mails and left supportive comments, I didn’t want to leave you all hanging with nothing, so here’s what I know: we followed up last week, and found out, for certain, that the people responsible for the show really liked what I did. As far as I know, I’m at the top of their list for the job. But we haven’t heard anything from the network people, who are ultimately responsible for making all the decisions.

And that’s where we’ve been, sort of floating in the doldrums on the Sea of Waiting. As far as I know, the show is still going to happen. As far as I know, when it does, I’m one of the first guys they are going to talk to about hosting it. And as soon as we open the box, I’ll let you know if the cat is dead or alive.

Until I know something new, let’s all ponder the meaning of life with these owls:

Orly

Yarly

dark miracle – a trip to trinity

Posted on By Wil

The Trinity Test Site , where Robert Oppenheimer famously became "Death, destroyer of worlds" is open to the public only twice a year, so it’s pretty tough to get a first-hand look at this rather important historical location.

Enter Joshua Ellis, an independent journalist who went to Trinity this year to compile a story on the site, the people, and its history. Josh’s trip was funded by small donations from various people, and he promised to publish an in-depth story with a ton of pictures, and video if he was able.

Josh’s story Dark Miracle is live today, and boy is it amazing:

When I told my friends where I was going, a few of them blinked at me. "Be careful," they said. "That’s, like, The Hills Have Eyes territory." I promised to pack at least a machete, somewhere in the car.

[. . .]

Many of the houses date from the original Manhattan Project —
prefab duplexes and quad-plexes that have been extensively retrofitted
by various owners over the years. It is easy, looking at some of these
houses, to imagine physicists such as Oppenheimer and Hans Bethe or
Edward Teller or Leo Szilard sitting on their porches, discussing
different approaches to building the Gadget, as they called it.

It is an odd little place — beautiful, to be sure, but it
seems devoid of the sort of small-town closeness that other small
American cities like it possess, where everybody knows everybody else.
There seem to be a lot of strangers living next to one another in Los
Alamos.

It is part history lesson and part travelogue; Josh paints vivid pictures that put the reader right next to him on every step of the journey, whether it’s talking to Ed Grothus, the excentric owner of the Black Hole Museum of Nuclear Waste, driving up to the test site, or looking at what’s left of ground zero. There are pictures and video, as well as entries in his blog that give additional details and perspective to his story. It is really a remarkable project.

As a reader, I count myself lucky that I got to read this piece; as a writer, I am absolutely thrilled at the idea of freelancing stories that are funded through small contributions from many different people. Josh brilliantly released his story under a creative commons license, so more people can see the benefits of distributed journalism.

(via boingboing)

Sony Leaks PS3 Price

Posted on By Wil

I swear to jeebus, it’s a good thing so many geeks still live with
their parents, and the rest of them made brazillians in the dot com
boom, because these game systems are getting stupid expensive.

parked under the sunsphere

Posted on By Wil

The kids are on Spring Break this week. Anne and Ryan are up in HellaNorCal, checking out colleges, and Nolan and I are hanging out with the dogs until they get back.

It’s been a really fun week so far: lots of Magic: The Gathering, Brawl tournaments, The Los Angeles Dodgers of Los Angeles on TV, and walks with the dogs around the neighborhood when it isn’t raining.

I’ve also introduced him to Lost, and I have the feeling that he’ll run through Season One on DVD in five days, just like I did. Hopefully, he won’t become as hopelessly just-jam-it-into-my-veins addicted to the show as I am (I’m only up to Episode 4 of Season Two, so if you’re going to comment, please don’t post any spoilers, okay? I reserve a special type of wrath for that sort of thing) but I managed to hook him on Battlestar Galactica this way, and I apologize for nothing. Nothing!!1one!

Sorry. I got a little carried away there.

So.

I’ve always felt that, as a parent, my job (and greatest hope) is to help my kids grow into the kind of adult that I’d be proud of, and I’d like to spend time with, even if we weren’t family: honest, honorable, generous, compassionate, and responsible. Sometimes, as part of the whole Pod People experience, I feel like those efforts are failing. Add the bonus of the really great and neverending loyalty conflict game (that I refuse to play, but have to deal with, anyway,) and it’s easy to wonder if any of the work will ever pay off. It’s been easy to lose hope.

But over the last couple of months, I’ve come to believe that the Pods were actually Chrysalises, because it feels like both Ryan and Nolan have emerged as young adults whose company I really enjoy (and I believe the feeling is mutual.) The moments of irrationality are still there, and I’m sure that I am still so lame from time to time, but I have lots and lots of hope.

If you’re a parent dealing with a Pod Person, don’t give up. One day, you may wake to discover that your Pod Person has vanished as quickly as it arrived, leaving behind an honest, honorable, generous, compassionate, and responsible young adult.

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