Alright, already...

So, I'm playing in a game of Scion, (a tabletop RPG in which the players portray the children of various gods from various mythologies) and for laughs, I ripped off Rich Berlew's brilliant webcomic, the Order of the Stick. (Click images to enlarge).

It started with the need to illustrate the mysterious cause of an explosion:



After that, a title page ensued:

From left to right, they are: Toni, daughter of Ptah; Sabina, daughter of Ares; Violet, daughter of Baron Samedi; Ray, son of Raijin and Mick, son of Poseidon. Oh, and Mick's faithful companion Daxter.

Most recently, and perhaps best of all, was the explanation of Poseidon's potency:

St00pd Numb3rs and other random things.

So, here I am watching Numb3rs, and frickin' Larry busts out with Pascal's Wager. If you're not familiar with it, here's a nice example:

Really? That's your argument? *facepalm*

I shoulda expected it from him, metaphysical monk-loving wackjob that he is.

It's just annoying:

1) P's W assumes a single deity, and ignores the fact that there are a multitude of often opposing religions.

2) P's W assumes that god (or whatever) is too retarded to detect cynical insincerity.

3) P's W forgets that you do loose things, albeit to varying degrees, in any given religion. Time, logic, rationality, self determination, free will, a sense of personal freedom... and much, much more.

Damn it, if you're gonna make an argument, at least make a new one. Fail.

Yes... expecting originality from the t.v... I know. Silly me.

No, but really...

The boss is on vacation this week, so I'm super tired. Finally have a day off tomorrow, which I will use to rest and shoot things, maybe actually explore Liberty City.

Also, coming up next month, the bestest birthday outing evar: a great new exhibit is opening at the Exploratorium on my birthday! Win.

Iron Underwear and Inoperable Shrapnel

Disclaimer: I have not read any of the Iron Man comics. I just saw the movie. Once. I'm bound to get some things wrong.

Well, I saw the movie Iron Man, and all in all, it was good. I saw it with friends and I liked it.

So:

Start with one immensely spoiled, emotionally undeveloped man-child. Torture him for a couple of months and make him rely on his own know-how to escape. Cook at 450 degrees for fourty-five minutes... oh, wait, that last bit is for my frozen pizza. Anyhow, presto-chango, insta-super-hero.

Oh, and there's shrapnel in his heart, or near his heart. Or something. The fellow who explains it isn't very clear. Something about the itsy-bitsy bits of metal worming their way into in important organs i.e. Tony Stark's heart. So, instead of removing said pieces of metal, some guy, we'll call him Bob-o, constructs an elaborate electro-magnet hooked up to a car battery to keep the killer metal shards from going further into his chest. Now, I may be wrong, but it seems to be that if you just, I dunno, used a stronger magnet, you could just suck all that nasty killer junk right out. And yeah, that would have some problems too, but I doubt it would be more invasive than, oh, I don't know... a giant metal-lined cylindrical cavity carved into the man's chest.

So, now having been on the receiving end of his own weapons, Stark decides to reconsider the whole Merchant of Death job. He runs up against some trouble selling the new peace-sort-of-liking image to the rest of Stark Industries. While being pushed out of the company's daily business, Stark goes to make an unexpected appearance at a Disney-Benefit-for-Orphaned-Firefighting-Puppies (or something) and finally notices that his assistant, Pepper Potts is female... Finally paying attention to her, because she has her hair down and is wearing a backless dress. Obviously, a female can't be an interesting person unless she is also scantily clad.

Despite these things, I really enjoied the movie. It was visually interesting, the CG integrating (to my untrained eye at least) almost seamlessly with the real-life acting. The timing, comedic and otherwise was so good as to seem almost lyrical and it wasn't cut short, which is often a problem with good movies... they end to soon. I enjoyed every minute of it, really, (save for the bits I missed due to my tiny bladder). And I recommend staying through the credits. Really.

I mean it.