That’s why I like Clarke’s short fiction so much more than his novels (and the same for Asimov). They have really great ideas, and no notion of how to create or develop a character. Better to be introduced to a brilliant world or idea and then go to the next one than have to follow someone boring.

Sips of the Yogscast has a recent playthrough of this game where he fails to realize that intelligence is a very important stat. It is delightful:

Shouldn’t calling them “pussies” be more insulting to cats and not to women? The term comes from pussy-cats (ie scaredy-cat) and “pussy” was attributed to female genitalia later and separately.

I just came over from an article about the new Supergirl pilot where Jimmy Olsen is black. Surprise, there was lots of racist chatter in the comments there too.

I didn’t see it either but, as far as I know, it is a vampire story. It was an attempt to Marvel-Cinematic-Universe (that’s a verb now) the Universal Horror monsters.

I feel much the same way about Dracula. Him being a blood-sucking monster is less interesting to me than Vlad’s actual life.

Thank you for boiling down my feelings about this show in a perfect sentence.

Can you sing with all the voices of the mountain?

I think it was Iron Man blowing up the downward-accelerating engines. Because just dropping a rock that size wouldn’t do much damage to the planet. It would suck locally, but meteors are moving really fast.

I really wish someone would do a faithful and complete adaptation of The Count of Monte Cristo. One where they don’t just throw out the later fourth of the book and all the character development.

This is exactly correct. A gritty police-procedural in an irredeemably corrupt Gotham with a naive young Gordon slowly being turned into the hard-bitten commissioner we know would be great. Every character being a future Bat-Villain was the worst thing that could have happened.

I helped a trucker carry some heavy stuff once, and he taught me the trucker's hitch in exchange. It is the single greatest thing that anyone has ever taught me in the space of a minute.

One of the best episodes of Smallville is "Transference," it has my favorite line.

I remember being so stingy with mp and torches that I refused to light up the swamp cave.

One ring to rule them all.

Speedtest.net would not be my first recommendation for speedtest site. It is flash based, and when you go there on a mobile device, it tries to get you to download an app.

Ah, thanks. Did not read carefully.

It is indeed. This happens at every high tide, at least, according to Wikipedia it does.

That is actually a myth. The word pussy, meaning coward, comes from pussycat. Like calling someone a scaredy-cat.

Isn't it though? Alien dad leads to a strange kid with (maybe) powers. I'm just gonna assume he can freeze time.