In the Meantime

Someone requested a special something from me. A little blog about a little thing, and I intend to fulfill that request. However, such a thing will take longer than the time I have this evening. Might even take a couple evenings, (and lunches), but I'll get there. So for now, here's an IOU.

I know. Terrible of me. But I wanna do this right. First bit of fiction I'll have written up for nigh on ages, and I want to make it... not shit. Let's start there and work our way up.

As an update on the last blog, I asked the Girl with the Lightsaber Tattoo out on a date. You know, via that website I mentioned. Light side points: she agreed. Fantastic, right? I thought so. She gave me a general idea of when would be best for her, and I responded with a time that would work best for me... and then never heard back from her. Dark side points. Thing is, this isn't the first time such a thing has happened. Dunno what the deal with that is. Few times that's been the case.

I'm none too upset about it now. Don't go feeling too bad about it. Just an interesting observation, is all. Strangeness of online dating, I suppose. Or lack of dating, to be more accurate.

Also, since this blog has almost no point other than to post something because it was requested (but not quite what was requested, though I do promise, it's in the works), here's a little song to go with that title...

Alternate Endings

For those who don't know, I keep an active profile on an online dating website. On occasion, I send messages to attractive ladies (which is sort of the point), and on even rarer occasion one will respond. A couple of times, these conversations have been about Star Wars tattoos. A recent one, in fact, which got me to thinking about the prequels while I was walking down to the hair salon.

I have this recurring thought that, one day, when I have extra time to just waste, I'll sit down and re-write the scripts for the prequels to make them, well... you know. Good. Of course, every nerd on the internet thinks he could have written about trilogy than George's prequels. Now my personal challenge is to keep as much as possible from the movies. I don't want to change a lot. Just enough to sort of streamline the storyline and make it a little more cohesive.

So as I'm writing this, I'm watching The Phantom Menace, which I do every now and again to try and remind (convince?) myself it's not as bad as you think it is. This has about a 50/50 success rate. This evening is a failure. Come on. How is it possible that a Jedi Master has no idea that Toydarians are immune to mind tricks? That's just silly.

I digress. So I was walking and thinking about what could be done to streamline these movies into a more cohesive (and arguably better) story, having just read this article earlier in the day, and an idea came to me.

Let's assume all else stays the same until toward the end of the movie. As I said before, the challenge is to do this with as little alteration as possible. Everything remains the same right up to the point that Qui Gon and Obi-Wan run off to fight Darth Maul. Well, that part is the same, too. We'll do a slight modification that, instead of hiding inside a fighter ship, which is a piss poor hiding place to begin with, the Anakin just hides behind some crates long enough to wait for the Jedi to stop looking, and then he chases after them. This seems more realistic to me, but then again, it's because that's what I would have done. I feel like even people in the Star Wars universe get as excited about a badass lightsaber duel as we do.

Leave the fight choreography the same. All the way up to the point where Obi-Wan is hanging from a nub in that pit and Darth Maul is being a douche and taunting him (as heels will do, always leading to their undoing). The difference here being that Anakin has (somehow, and it's just as plausible as the damn kid accidentally blowing up a space station) followed the three of them to this chamber. He runs in and sees Qui Gon on the ground. Obi Wan looks up and sees the kid. Darth Maul looks back and sees the kid. The kid sees Darth Maul.

Anger. Rage. Despair.

BOOM!

Force Push into the wall. Darth Maul held against the bulkhead by Anakin. Force Choke. Force Crush. Whatever snaps Maul's neck and he falls into the pit. Obi-Wan climbs out of the pit and goes to Anakin, beside Qui Gon. Obi-Wan can still make the promise to train Anakin at this point, but there's an obvious threat. This kid is too powerful to be left alone. You can't let that kid wander around without guidance. Obi-Wan takes him on in hopes of leading him down a better path.

Which, of course, gives us plenty of reasons for Obi-Wan to smother Anakin throughout his training, and for the Jedi Council to consistently deny him promotions, advancement, etc. Everything the Jedi do is in an effort to keep this kid on the straight and narrow. Then, as with any young teenager, he rebels against his strict upbringing and becomes Darth Vader.

Or, you know, something like that. So... yeah. There it is.

Also, I really want one of these.

The New Hotness

I have an ancient fucking phone. I've had it for two, maybe three years now, and it was almost outdated when we got them. Yes. We. More on that later. This thing is a relic, but it's served me well. I don't need a lot of fancy shit. For the most part, I just send text messages, and the phone is more than capable of doing that, (though, as most all my friends will tell you, the buttons click something ridiculous when I'm typing). So it hasn't been an issue for me, as far as being outdated. I'm not a tech geek. I've superglued this thing back together a couple of times, the battery life on it has drained down to just a little over a day (far less if I make a phone call), and it occasionally just shuts itself off for no reason.

All these things I've sort of just been dealing with, totally putting off getting a new one. But over the past couple of weeks, the screen has begun to fritz out on me. I'll slide it open or close and the screen will just pixelate. Half of it goes black. This is concerning. This is something that, clearly, is going to be a problem that I can't exactly work around. So unfortunately, it was time to break down and get a new phone.

Which I did on Saturday. Now, for various reason, I'm forced to do a pre-paid plan (I honestly don't have an issue with this at all), so I went to the cellular provider to see what sort of phones they had in my price range. I found this LG I was kinda into (options are pretty limited on pre-paid phones, so it was just the best of the lot, really), and a decent pre-paid plan. The fella comes over to help me out, checks the back room... and the phone isn't in stock. He checks the computer, and no other stores have one in stock, either. Well, there was one in Marysville/Smokey Point, but I was in Lynnwood and about to head out to my friends' wedding party (which was fun), so it wasn't much of an option to go up north again. I left the store empty handed.

Now, those who know me will know that, quite often, I get very singularly minded. I had set out to buy a phone, and gods damn it, I was going to buy a fucking phone. So I took a chance and drove across the street to Target just to see if they had the phone. Sure enough, there were like four of them on the shelf. Boom. Bam. Done.

New phone, bitches.

The downside is, I have no idea how to use this fucking thing. It's a little more advanced than the antique I've been using. I sort of went out to get something a little more fancy, mostly so I can use the Twitters and the Facebooks on it. The learning curve is a bit steep, so I'm figuring it out. At the moment, I'm in the process of transferring all my numbers over from one phone to the other.

If you're wondering why I don't just swap the SIM cards, well... now we're back to what I said we'd talk about earlier. The ancient phone I've been using I picked up before I moved out to Seattle (OK, so it has been three years... maybe even four depending how long before we moved out here I got it). This was back when I was still on speaking terms with my parents, and we were all on one of those family plans together. No problem, really. Cheaper and I didn't have to deal with the hassle, which is great.

Fast forward a few years later, and I've been in Seattle for fucking ever and still have an Indiana number. There's a part of me that's felt, for a bit, that it might be time to let that go. You know, move on. The last bit of settling here would be changing the area code on my phone number. Prove I'm a resident. Or at least trying to be.

The other thing is that I am 100% certain the only reason I still have the (now old) phone is that my mother has been using it to spy on me. It's still on the family plan, and I can almost guarantee she checks out the phone records to see what I've been up to. It's creepy and weird, I know... but it's true. So the safer bet would be to just transfer the numbers over, and not the SIM card, to make sure that she can't track the number or something (I'd swear she has friends in the CIA that could do some crazy spy shit if she asked them to).

Anyway, there was an actual point of some sort to this. I was planning to wrap it up in something funny or clever, but the whole idea got lost in the writing process. Now it's just kind of a boring story about buying a new phone. Damn.

Even My Subconscious Can't Get Laid

This is a post for all the psych types out there to analyze me up and tell me what the hell's going on. Also anyone out there who thinks they can read dreams, well... read this.

So the other night I had a dream. We were in the old Evansville townhouse, and I think there was going to be a party. Like, it hadn't started yet, but a few people were there in the living room and we were all kinda hanging out. It's fuzzy, cause, well, you know... dream. I'm in the living room with people and we're talking or something and there's this loud banging on the ceiling from what I immediately realize is the woman in the bathroom. She calls my name. I walk upstairs.

OK. I open up the bathroom door, and apparently in my dream we have a magic bathroom. Like that tent in Goblet of Fire that's a hundred times bigger than it looks. Yeah. It's like that. I open the door and walk into a bathroom that's about the size of the bottom floor of my current house/apartment. Whatever the hell I live in. Anyway, there's this broad sitting in the tub, (bubble bath, of course), shaving. And I'll be damned if it isn't Elizabeth fucking Berkley.

She wants me to help her with something. I don't even remember what. It's not that important. She finishes whatever it is she's doing, and I'm hanging out in the bathroom, checking myself out in the mirror. We're chatting. She gets out of the tub and wraps up in a towel and I'm getting ready to leave, because, well I figure my work here is done.

"You're not just gonna leave me like this, are you?"

"Like what?"

I don't remember the next part, but it leads to her dropping the towel and us making out. We'll skimp out on the ultra sexy details of where our hands ended up, but let's just say things got hot. And quick. So I'm about to make with the sweet lovin' when she, very responsibly, reminds me to wrap it up.

Anyone want to guess how this one's going to end?

I leave the bathroom and scurry over to her bedroom. She lives there, I guess. And she keeps condoms on the nightstand. Convenient. So I slide it on as I'm walking out of the room (in hindsight, this seems like something I'd have difficulty with in real life) and... son o fa bitch. There's like six people standing outside the bathroom, the door is open and someone is talking to her. She's got clothes on now.

SERIOUSLY?!

Phew. OK. Deep breath...

I have this running joke that I tell myself and sometimes other people. It's not as funny when I tell them, though. Sometimes I think I'm much more clever than I am. Sometimes you asshats are just fucking ingrates and you wouldn't know funny if it beat you with your own dick. The joke is that I'm so unathletic I'm also bad at sports games. Not just real sports, which I'm horrible at. But sports simulations. Video games. Which, generally, I'm pretty decent at. Above average in most respects, I'd like to think. But Madden? Fuck. I'm shit. It's just... bad. Terribad.

Now the same thesis can sorta be applied to this dream scenario. Needless to say, the dream ended and I did not have crazy monkey fucking time with Jessie Spano. This is disappointing. No. Really. Think about it. This was my own gods damned dream, and I still couldn't get laid. Like, this is my brain, making shit up, and it decided that, for whatever reason, some mother fuckers would walk upstairs and cock block my attempts at boning Elizabeth Berkley.

My ability to get laid is so lacking that, even in my own dreams, I can't pull this shit off. And this isn't the first time this has happened, either. In the history of sexy dreams, and there have been a few, I don't remember a single time that I actually managed to score. I can remember a couple of these dreams specifically, involving certain people (it might be you), where something happened and just before I'm about to do the deed... shit falls apart.

Which is where you kids come in. For the dream readers and the psych analysts out there, I ask... wassupwitdat? I'm actually kind of curious if someone can come up with an explanation  or whatever for this. Honestly, I find it a bit amusing. I mean, it's just a dream, so it's not like I'm going to get too upset. But it does happen pretty much every time, and I feel like there must be some weird psychological theory or condition or voodoo that will attempt to explain it. Which, I must say, I'm a bit anxious to hear.

Venom

Is it just me, or was that last post sorta lackluster? Felt like something was missing. The argument was there. It's definitely something I feel strongly about, but... Man. I dunno. Something didn't quite click. The structure was just... scattered? Is that it? Like it wasn't stacked quite right. Lots of words sort of just bleeding onto a page without much real cohesion.

I'm better than that. Should be, at least.

So there's this girl, right? Nice broad, so far as I can tell. Tweep (That's Twitter + Peep. I think.). She's got this thing about kicking me in the ass to write stuff. Which, I might say, is fucking fantastic. I need a good kick in the ass. It's about the only way I actually get shit done.

Hell of a statement, right? I mean, obviously I am aware of this very particular problem. I lack proper self-motivation. But I can't seem to do much about it. It's all mental, obviously. That is to say, I'm mental. Of course. Psychologically speaking, (as if I'm an expert on such things), I've got an issue I need to overcome. Just... haven't. Can't?

Not sure. Something was broken. Not now. Well, probably still, but... before. It snapped. I blogged about it, I'm sure. I haven't been able to sit down and write in far too long. Months. A great many. But this broad comes along and sends me a couple messages to get me back on track and... here we are. Blabbing away like some idiot as if anyone will actually read this. (She will, but you know, I mean anyone else).

I've come to the conclusion that I'm a parasite. Feeding off the energy of others. It's not the actual act of writing I need help with. I'm damn fucking good at that (more often than not). If there's one thing I'm confident in, it's the fact that I can write. It's that motivation I need help with. For as much as I can want to, for as much as I can sit with an idea in my head for years... it just doesn't happen. I can sit and stare at a blank page and try to pump some bullshit out. And that's exactly what comes out. Bullshit.

Nothing good, though. Nothing like the sort of thing I'm capable of. Send me someone with a little bit of enthusiasm, though, and I'm back in the game. The best stuff I've ever done has been when working with other people. The creation of Tyler Rayne, (If you don't know, you will soon. At least I hope...). That damned war story we started years ago at the Welcome Friends house.

Put me in a room, (a chat window, phone call, or e-mail thread will work just as well). Give me someone to talk to. Bounce ideas off of. That's the kind of shit that gets me excited about writing. When other people are on board. When I know that I'm not working just for myself. That's when I'm at my best.

I don't want to be a parasite. I'll be a symbiote instead. That's more mutual, right? You give me someone with the energy and excitement that I can enhance. I take that and amplify it and transfer it into something written and wonderful. Someone gets excited about reading, I get even more excited about writing... it's a complete circle of total awesome. Just, you know, I gotta have that conduit to feed off of first.

Or I guess I could just suck it up, be responsible, and work like an adult instead of relying on other people to inspire me. But where's the fun in that?

Third Wheel

As a general rule, I hate the Special Guest Referee gimmick. It is, without doubt, my least favorite match stipulation of all times. It never adds to a match, and more often than not, subtracts from it. It's just... a terribad idea. Especially when lumped onto a match that has more than sold itself with no gimmicks and no stipulations... just two dudes going head-to-head.

The thing about the Special Guest Referee is it immediately takes all the wind out of the match. It doesn't matter who is in the ring, or what kind of 5-Star caliber performance they put on, in the end, you know damn well some shenanigans are going down with that special referee. It's sort of like watching an M. Night Shyamalan movie. You spend so much time waiting for the twist or trying to figure out what it is that you're actually distracted from watching. That's the thing with the special referee. Something is going to happen. Otherwise, why would there be a special guest referee at all?

The addition of this third wheel all but guarantees that something shady is going down. Just a matter of when. Even if we were to let that slide and try to enjoy the match, the problem is that the special referee is often just as popular as the two opponents. Which means that, even if you're not worried about the end of the match and what might happen, you're constantly distracted by this other guy you really like, too. Or hate. Either way, he (or she) has your attention. Which again means you're not focusing on the match or the people participating in it.

I was pretty pumped for Cena vs Punk at Summerslam. It certainly doesn't need anything added to it. That match has made itself, mostly on the hard work of those two dudes to sell a damn good wrestling storyline. I was looking forward to a damn good sequel to a hell of a match those two put on at Money in the Bank. And I honestly have no doubts that their Summerslam rematch will be a 5-Star event just like the last one. With the one small asterisks of whatever tomfoolery HHH gets involved in. We'll see what happens. I'm sure it'll work. Whatever they have planned up their sleeve, it'll work. I'm putting my faith in that. However, at this moment, and even going into it... that's not what I was excited for. And it's not what I wanted to see.

I know women wear pants...

...because I'm always trying to get them off.

Someone told me that Tuesdays were good for blogging. As it turns out, it's a Tuesday. I also have a blog. So... fuck it. Let's see what I've still got.

Now I've been debating all day about what exactly I wanted to blog about. Trying my best to avoid personal issues, but that's what's prevalent on my mind right now... until a co-worker showed me this. He was actually bitching about the fact that everyone looks like "angry Hulk" on this cover, (which, they kinda do), but what I picked up on was the mostly naked woman standing front and center.

Look, I like half-naked women as much as the next dude (more than the next dude if the fella standing beside me is Randy), but it just doesn't make sense for super females to wear underwear. Well, nothing but underwear, at any rate. Diana can go commando for all I care, so long as she's doing it with pants on. Which, I guess, is sort of the definition of commando. Otherwise, you'd just be naked, right? Halvsies, anyway.

When I was thirteen, Jim Lee's Psylocke was like the greatest fucking thing in the world. Pretty sure she's the reason I even like the color purple. I mean... damn. OK. Comic book or not, Psylocke is fucking hot.

But that's sort of the point. She's a British dame (uber sexy accent) in a ninja's body (hot Asian chick). She's all sorts of designed to be a Frankenstein creation of male teen fantasies. So, you know, her wearing underwear... yeah. I get it. What else is she going to wear?

Wonder Woman, on the other hand, is the female superhero. There's not even a question about that. It's scientific fact. It's probably in the Old Testament somewhere. I mean, really, she's it. About this time last year, did sort of a "reboot" on WW and hit us with this controversial redesign.

I thought it was awesome. It feels like a real evolution. Say what you will for the storyline (I was really into it at first, but it has kind of meandered since then), but it was a bold move that made sense. Sure, fanboys are going to bitch about it, but honestly... how many world renowned figures can you name that still dress like it's the 70s?

A few months ago, DC announced an entire "relaunch" of their comic books. Some crazy retcon/reboot hybrid with new costumes, new origins and new, exciting stories. To go along with that, they showed us this and this.

That second one is sort of important, because as you'll see, DC has made a quiet little policy of "never" (a word that has no real meaning in the comics world) putting underwear on the outside of tights again. Yep. That's right. No more Batbriefs. No more red undies on the outside of Supe's tights. Those days are over. Now we move forward into a new, more civilized era.

Until today. Until this.

In a world where men refuse to put underwear outside of their armored tights, Wonder Woman, the single most recognizable female superhero in the history of mankind... a third of the Trinity that holds DC and the Justice League together... is wearing NOTHING BUT HER GOD DAMN FUCKING UNDERWEAR.

Look, it'll never be a secret that I like scantily clad women. A lot. Too much? Maybe. Whatever. That's not the point. The point is that even I, horrible man-type that I am, can see that Wonder Woman is more than just some dame in a bikini. She's an icon. A role model to, well... OK, find me a woman that didn't want to be Wonder Woman at some point in her life. And if you do find her, ask her why, and she'll probably tell you she didn't want to run around in her underwear all gods damned day.

Simply put, Diana deserves better. DC is taking bold strides to try and shake things up. To present their audience, both long-time readers and new fans, with something interesting and different. Something new. Something fresh.

Jesus Christ, kids, we've got a dark skinned Spider-Man now. You tellin' me we can't have a warrior princess with clothes on?

Fuck you, DC. Just... suck a dick. Suck it long. And suck it hard. You bastards.