2019-11-30

Slaughterhouse-Five

If anyone wants to know what Kurt Vonnegut's books are like, this is the one to give them. It's not his best nor his most interesting (in my opinion) but it's the one that seems to be most representative of his style and what he was about.

I think I'd have like this one better if I'd read it as a teenager - or at least read it before Mother Night - but it's still good.

If you've read any of his other books and want more, you should definitely read this one. If you haven't read any of his books, this is probably a good one to start with.

2019-09-30

Preacher - End of the World

This show was an incoherent mess that just got worse and worse as it went on. The first season was kind of OK and that's the best it ever got. It's all down hill from there.

2019-09-25

My media setup

I have two computers, three monitors and four speakers - not counting the laptops, phones, etc. What I wanted was to be able to have the sounds played on either computer come out of the same speakers and for each computer to have its own dedicated monitor with the third being shared between them. My solution is not perfect, but it works.

2019-09-12

My Latest Nemesis: James Allen

Mark Trail is a syndicated comic strip ostensibly about nature and conservation. Originally written by Ed Dodd it was passed on first to Jack Elrod and then to James Allen. Being a climate-change denier who can't draw or write, James is possibly the least qualified person the syndicate could have chosen. Also he really, really wants you to know that he is not even angry, he's laughing actually.

Make yourself a cup of tea, this is going to be a long one.

2019-09-11

Zinger Pie

I think the only other thing I've ever bought from KFC was a Double Down, back when those were a thing, so I don't know what the Zinger chicken is normally like. Also, I thought it wasn't called Kentucky Fried Chicken any more? Did they change back?

2019-07-19

You Always Hurt the One You Love

You always hurt the one you love 
The one you shouldn't hurt at all 
You always take the sweetest rose 
And crush it till the petals fall

2019-07-08

2019-07-04

2019-06-11

Every episode of House MD

I haven't watched House since it finished, but I'm pretty sure I remember exactly what it's like.

2019-05-31

The Twilight Zone - Blurryman

Good thing this season's over because after this there's no way I'm watching any more. Boring, irritating, incoherent, dumb. That could be a description of this episode or the series as a whole.

2019-05-24

The Twilight Zone - The Blue Scorpion

I have absolutely no idea what the point of this one was. You keep waiting for there to be a reason and there just isn't. It's kind of like The Comedian and Nightmare at 30,000 Feet - a supernatural force decides to fuck with people's lives and there's nothing they can do about it. The end.

2019-05-16

The Twilight Zone - Point of Origin

This show's writers seem to have a pathological fear of subtlety. Another episode that was a perfectly fine concept but slowed way down and explained in excruciating detail to try to make sure that absolutely nobody missed the point. Even before anything happened it was really obvious what the message as going to be and the entire rest of the episode was basically pointless. Even the twist was telegraphed a mile off.

2019-05-10

The Twilight Zone - Not All Men

This episode was basically fine. The only real problem with it is the same as with Replay - they just don't trust the audience at all. There's a simple message and they make sure to spell it out and repeat it just in case you didn't get it the first time.

2019-05-03

The Twilight Zone - Six Degrees of Freedom

This one was OK, I guess? It felt like an adaptation of a short story from the '60s though. Like, not a specific one that I remember reading, it just had that vibe of the old sci-fi short stories I used to read a lot of. The cast would probably have been different back then, but the story would have been identical. And if it had been written in the '60s it would be perfectly fine, but in a modern TV show it's weirdly outdated.

2019-04-20

The Twilight Zone - A Traveler

"You're entering a realm which is unusual. Maybe it's magic, or contains some kind of monster ... The second one. Prepare to enter the Scary Door." - Futurama (I Dated A Robot)
It's like they based this show on the Futurama parody version. This episode is literally just "there's a weird creepy guy - turns out he's an alien." And that's it. That's the whole fucking episode. It's just weird for the sake of weirdness and then at the end there's an alien invasion that doesn't actually explain or justify anything that happened.

2019-04-19

Star Trek: Discovery - Such Sweet Sorrow, Part 2

Literally an hour of explosions, fights and people being ridiculously dramatic. It was incredibly boring. You could skip this episode (and the previous one) and just assume you know what happens - because you do.

2019-04-14

The Twilight Zone - Replay

OK, this episode was... not bad? Not great. Not surprising. Not really saying anything new or novel. But it had a point. It wasn't just weird shit happening for no reason. It may have been repeating things that have been said before, but at least it was saying something.

2019-04-12

Star Trek: Discovery - Such Sweet Sorrow, Part 1

What an absolute nothing of an episode. What a complete waste of time. It's all setup for the last episode, and we already know what's going to happen. You can't convince us that Spock is going to get stranded in the future forever because this is a prequel; we know that doesn't happen. We know that Discovery ends up in the future, and there are no crew on board because you literally told us that in Calypso. And nothing actually happens in this episode.

2019-04-07

The Twilight Zone - Nightmare at 30,000 Feet

I'd heard this was just going to be another remake of Nightmare at 20,000 Feet, and thankfully it wasn't. If I wanted to watch that again I'd just watch one of the previous versions. As the name suggests, it is based on it though. Only it makes less sense and doesn't seem to have a point. The original is a sort of twist on the boy who cried wolf, with people not believing him because his claims seem absurd, he has no evidence, and his medical history suggests unreliability. In this case, well, none of that seems to apply.

2019-04-05

Star Trek: Discovery - Through the Valley of Shadows

Red Angel; time crystals; Michael Michael Michael; Klingons. There. You're all caught up. Another bad episode that wasn't worth watching.

2019-04-02

The Twilight Zone - The Comedian

Either this was a really bad episode to lead with, or, worse, this might actually be as good as it gets, in which case this series is going to be unbelievably bad.

2019-03-29

Star Trek: Discovery - Perpetual Infinity

What even happened in this episode? Basically nothing. It was all dumb and pointless and made me wonder why I'm even watching this terrible show.

2019-03-22

Star Trek: Discovery - The Red Angel

In the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy books there's a device that's designed to give you ultimate perspective, to allow you to know exactly how insignificant you are on a universal scale. Zaphod Beeblebrox is scheduled to be hooked up to this device, but before that can happen he's brought into a simulation, an exact copy of the universe that was created just for him, so when the device is activated he learns that he is the most important person in the entire universe and the very reason for its existence, thus sparing him the fate of having his mind destroyed by the true scale of his own worth. Star Trek: Discovery is that simulation, but for Michael Burnham. It's all about Michael. Everything.

2019-03-15

Star Trek: Discovery - Project Daedalus

This episode was a real land of contrasts. It was half great, half terrible. There was a lot of really good character stuff in there, but then the plot got in the way, and that ending - ugh. Just the worst. But I'll get to that. Let's start with the good bits.

2019-03-08

Star Trek: Discovery - If Memory Serves

Honestly, this episode was not bad. I think it helps that Spock has finally arrived so it's not just everyone talking about him all the time. The Talosians were kind of a weird thing to include because it's really not clear how they could possibly fit into the larger story, but they were fine. I'm also not sure where they're going with the Dr Boyfriend plot, but I guess we'll see.

2019-03-01

Star Trek: Discovery - Light and Shadows

Spock. Spock? Spock Spock. Spooooock. Spock? Spock? Spock. Spock! Spoooock! Yeah, this was a shit episode.

2019-02-22

Star Trek: Discovery - The Sound of Thunder

God what a dumb episode. Saru's backstory is the worst. Also, everyone makes really dumb decisions in this episode - and it turns out that the Bau'ls have warp travel so the prime directive doesn't even apply and the federation was still just letting slavery and genocide go on unopposed.

2019-02-15

Star Trek: Discovery - Saints of Imperfection

This was an extremely irritating episode. You know that thing where there's some kind of time limit, like a ticking bomb or something, and the characters just stand around chatting instead of getting the fuck out of there as quickly as possible? Yeah, that's, like, half this episode. And the other half is stupid Section 31 bullshit.

2019-02-08

Star Trek: Discovery - An Obol for Charon

You know what? Last week might have just been them shaking off the last of season one. This week we're back to some definite Star Trek. Not what I'd call great Star Trek, but it definitely felt pretty damn Star Treky. They're starting to bring the bridge crew into the show more, the main story of the episode was centred on a one-time weird thing they encountered in space, and they had people working together and trying to avoid resorting to violence.

2019-02-01

Star Trek: Discovery - Point of Light

This episode just had everything going on. It was a real mess. The Klingons are back with their dumb Klingon bullshit. As I predicted, Tilly tried to keep her hallucinations secret. And also remember spock and the red angels? That stuff's still happening. Evil Georgiou is also back as part of stupid Section 31, which is evidently going to be very important this season. So with all these different things happening at the same time, there wasn't much actual plot. More just setting a bunch of stuff up to presumably pay off later.

Why I Love Vivaldi

The web browser, that is. Well, one of the reasons. I actually like a lot of things about it and dislike some others but overall it's the best option available. I might write more about it some other time but I just felt like writing about this particular feature today. What feature? The options you get when you right-click on a hyperlink.

2019-01-25

Star Trek: Discovery - New Eden

This was probably the most Star-Treky episode of the series so far. Apart from the season-long storyline stuff it could have been a mediocre episode of TNG - except that in TNG they were a lot better about talking to each other and sharing information.

2019-01-18

Star Trek: Discovery - Brother

I just have to say right up front, this season looks like it's going to be better than last season. I want to make that clear because I don't have much nice to say about this episode because there just wasn't much to it. The specific plot of the episode is mostly filler and what's left is setting things up for the rest of the season. It was already more fun than last season though, and I like Pike so far.

2019-01-05

Tell Me a Story: Forgiveness

Well, that was anticlimactic. All three stories ended in about the least interesting way possible. And the connections between them never actually became relevant. Like, big pig is the cop who's investigating teacher wolf and red's father's girlfriend is Hansel and Gretel's witch, but none of the characters even seem to be aware of these connections. They certainly don't have any effect on each other's stories.

2019-01-04

Star Trek: Discovery - The Escape Artist

The fourth and final Short Trek is centred on the recurring character of Harry Mudd. I still don't know why they thought he was worth bringing back from TOS, but he's fine, I guess. And this episode is also fine. It's a bit like Calypso in that there's really nothing new or unique about it but it was well-executed.

2019-01-02

Doctor Who: Resolution

Well, that was terrible. Forget the fact that they called the monster a Dalek - because that word clearly has no meaning any more - this was just a badly written story. The B plot about Ryan's father was actually quite good, but it didn't have anything to do with the rest of the episode and seemed to just be there to fill time.