I'm trying it again this year.
I'd created an online blog just as a place to type out personal motivationals (get to work, dammit!) and I think this time I've done a better job of creating characters, set pieces, plot...
Knock on formica, I start this Saturday.
Tuesday, September 1, 2009
Saturday, July 11, 2009
Why Harry Potter?
In 1997, based on a search in OCLC WorldCat, there were 83 English language books written about magic that would be considered Juvenile fiction (search term - Su: Magic Juvenile Fiction).
One of those books was Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, published in the UK. The US market would get the book in 1998 (retitled with Sorcerer's Stone), published among 90 such fictional works.
This book would go on to sell 300,000 copies by 1999 in the UK and roughly 11 million (hardback AND paperback) in the US; top bestsellers lists; spawn a series of equally mass-selling books - nay spawn an entire industry of toys, foods, and other books; get made into blockbuster movies; and basically turn childrens' literary publishing into a financial behemoth as hundreds of other would-be Rowlings scribbled out pale imitations to cash in (with only a handful - Lemony Snicket comes to mind - showing any originality deserving our love).
The deal is, why? Why this book? What was it about the first Harry Potter book that made it so popular?
The reasons why are that firstly Rowling created memorable characters and memorable settings, and secondly like any good author Rowling stole (c'mon. Every artist a cannibal, every poet a thief...) from the good and/or great storytellers that came before.
The earliest comparisons Rowling got were to another well-known children's author, Roald Dahl, whose classics (Matilda, James and the Giant Peach, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory) were detailed child's-eye-view-of-the-world tales replete with adult (and child) grotesques. Are there any true differences between Matilda's uncaring parents the Wormwoods and Harry's Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon Dursley? Draco Malfoy and Veruca Salt are practically siblings (hate to think of them as boyfriend/girlfriend shudder. Oh God I hope there's no fanfic on that). Dolores Umbridge and Mrs. Trunchbull have to fight it out as Worst Teacher Ever. These characters are archetypes: bad parents, spoiled children, officious and uncaring bureaucrats, and all of them bullies to boot. Note too the detail of names, how they roll off the tongue as literally defining each character and yet made colorfully off-beat.
Rowling also borrowed heavily on a form of literature better recognized in England than in the US: that of the Boarding School coming-of-age tales. Such tales were prevalent when boarding schools dotted the British landscape, mainly the Victorian and Edwardian periods. Post-WWII era with a decline in such schools being replaced by regular public-funded schools also meant a decline in such stories, replaced by standard coming-of-age tales. Boarding school stories focused on basic themes: friendships made, bullies defeated, sporting events won. Said sporting events usually cricket or football (no broom-riding sports I'm afraid, old bean).
It might surprise, but Rowling also steals from a British author more popular than her: Agatha Christie. Potter books are - for the most part - plotted like murder mysteries: Whodunnit? (also How'd They Do It? and Why'd They Do It?) Who's stealing the Philosopher's Stone? Who opened the Chamber of Secrets? Why after 13 years is Sirius Black coming after Harry Potter now (or is he...?), and how is he doing it? Who really betrayed Harry's parents to Voldemort? Who put Harry's name in the Goblet of Fire? What's Voldemort want with the Department of Mysteries? Who is the Half-Blood Prince? What are Horcruxes? And the most important question of all: When will Josh and Donna make out? Oh wait wrong fanfic obsession... And that was resolved halfway through Season 7 anywho, but I digress.
Last but not least, the real reason Harry Potter sparked so much interest: Rowling followed the basic rules and plotlines of the Monomyth. And while Joseph Campbell's critics can argue that over-reliance of the monomyth as simple plot structure has led to a lot of crappy fiction, you can't argue when it's done right (Star Wars, the Matrix, even Star Trek). And Rowling gets it right. It also doesn't hurt that she follows a lot of fantasy-themed elements set down in The Encyclopedia of Fantasy, a reference that was in the works just as she published the first Potter book.
She created foremost a world that is both mundane but magical. Obviously, she created a Hero (Harry Potter) but also loyal Companions (Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger) who provide the Hero with vital tools: Ron gives Harry access to the Weasley family who act as advocates and guides to a Wizarding world he's unfamiliar with (as well as providing a surrogate home the Burrows) while allowing Ron opportunities to shine separately from his successful older brothers; Hermione provides knowledge and problem-solving skills that otherwise would lay dormant. There are additional Companions as well, notable among them Hagrid, Neville Longbottom and Luna Lovegood. Harry has his Mentor in Albus Dumbledore, although Remus Lupin and later Sirius Black provide Mentoring as well. And there's the Pariah Elite formed as the Order of the Phoenix, the wizard resistance formed to fight Voldemort and his Death Eater minions. And Snape... I'm tempted to place him as a Threshold Guardian, but arguably as the most complex character Rowling created pinning Snape down to any one Role is tricky. One more obviously is that Rowling created a Dark Lord (literally) in Tom Marvolo Riddle AKA Lord Voldemort, who threatened both Wizarding and Muggle worlds (The Land) with Plight... and like all Dark Lords he may be powerful but can be maddeningly blind to obvious flaws in his various plans to rule/destroy the world. Voldemort violates Rule 6 nearly every book he appears. Sheesh. Oddly enough, Voldemort never evens tries to violate "Rule 34. I will not turn into a snake. It never helps."
With the pieces in place, she follows most if not all of the monomyth rules faithfully: the Call to Adventure comes with that first letter from Hogwarts (addressed to the abused Harry's "Cupboard Under the Stairs"). The Refusal of the Call isn't Harry's fault: his aunt and uncle despise Wizardy and hoped by abusing Harry they would crush it out of him. Supernatural Aid comes via Hagrid who ensures the Call to Adventure is heeded, and Hagrid is the first to escort Harry into the Wizarding World (Diagon Alley) and help him locate tools (Wand, Owl, School Supplies) to assist in his survival. The Crossing the First Threshold and the beginning of the Road of Trials are basically Harry's first journey to his new school Hogwarts, during which he meets his Companions (Ron, Hermione and Neville) as well as Enemy/obstacle Draco Malfoy who acts as a bully and minor threat for most of the overall series. Draco is merely a representative of the True Threat Voldemort, reflecting Voldemort's bigotry and sadism but unable to truly achieve the malice of his Dark Lord. Past this, the book series is replete with Thresholds to pass and overcome, and various Belly of the Whales that Harry must survive: Entering the final chamber to confront the person stealing the Sorceror's Stone; Entering the Chamber of Secrets to save Ginny; Entering the Shrieking Shack to save Ron and confront Sirius Black (and the Truth and Atonement with the Father that Sirius represents); Entering a labyrinth that would lead to Voldemort and the Death Eaters at the end of the Third Trial of the Triwizard Tournament; Entering the Department of Mysteries to rescue Sirius Black but instead facing a trap; Entering Tom Riddle's childhood cave to recover a Horcrux; and with the last novel Entering an otherwise impenetrable goblin bank to steal a Horcrux, Entering the Room of Requirement to locate another Horcrux, and Entering the Forbidden Forest to finally confront his own Death (?) at Voldemort's hand. That's a lotta whale bellies.
There's Apotheosis with Harry's self-sacrifice at Voldemort's hand in the final book, but that leads to the Boon, the wisdom and knowledge gained in the Afterlife. With the Boon (knowledge that Harry is no longer a Horcrux, and the realization that Voldemort doesn't have true mastery of the Elder Wand) Harry considers for a moment the Refusal to Return, then acknowledges he must Return to bestow the Boon to everyone else by destroying Voldemort once and for all. He returns to the mundane world but is Master of Two Worlds (the World of Magic and the World of the Afterlife), and exults in his Freedom to Live by showing he was and remains unafraid of Death, unlike Voldemort who fears Death and is destroyed by his own Killing curse.
There's probably a more detailed way (probably a whole book) of fitting the Harry Potter series into the Monomyth structure (I didn't even touch on the Goddess stuff), but the point is Potter-as-Monomyth works. And despite all the complaints about the Monomyth, it DOES create easily-read, easily-recognizable tales that appeal across the broad spectrum of storytelling (well, at least within Western/Eurocentric Literature). That's why Harry Potter got to be so popular 10 years ago, and why it's still popular today, and why it may yet remain popular 100 years from now.
One of those books was Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, published in the UK. The US market would get the book in 1998 (retitled with Sorcerer's Stone), published among 90 such fictional works.
This book would go on to sell 300,000 copies by 1999 in the UK and roughly 11 million (hardback AND paperback) in the US; top bestsellers lists; spawn a series of equally mass-selling books - nay spawn an entire industry of toys, foods, and other books; get made into blockbuster movies; and basically turn childrens' literary publishing into a financial behemoth as hundreds of other would-be Rowlings scribbled out pale imitations to cash in (with only a handful - Lemony Snicket comes to mind - showing any originality deserving our love).
The deal is, why? Why this book? What was it about the first Harry Potter book that made it so popular?
The reasons why are that firstly Rowling created memorable characters and memorable settings, and secondly like any good author Rowling stole (c'mon. Every artist a cannibal, every poet a thief...) from the good and/or great storytellers that came before.
The earliest comparisons Rowling got were to another well-known children's author, Roald Dahl, whose classics (Matilda, James and the Giant Peach, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory) were detailed child's-eye-view-of-the-world tales replete with adult (and child) grotesques. Are there any true differences between Matilda's uncaring parents the Wormwoods and Harry's Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon Dursley? Draco Malfoy and Veruca Salt are practically siblings (hate to think of them as boyfriend/girlfriend shudder. Oh God I hope there's no fanfic on that). Dolores Umbridge and Mrs. Trunchbull have to fight it out as Worst Teacher Ever. These characters are archetypes: bad parents, spoiled children, officious and uncaring bureaucrats, and all of them bullies to boot. Note too the detail of names, how they roll off the tongue as literally defining each character and yet made colorfully off-beat.
Rowling also borrowed heavily on a form of literature better recognized in England than in the US: that of the Boarding School coming-of-age tales. Such tales were prevalent when boarding schools dotted the British landscape, mainly the Victorian and Edwardian periods. Post-WWII era with a decline in such schools being replaced by regular public-funded schools also meant a decline in such stories, replaced by standard coming-of-age tales. Boarding school stories focused on basic themes: friendships made, bullies defeated, sporting events won. Said sporting events usually cricket or football (no broom-riding sports I'm afraid, old bean).
It might surprise, but Rowling also steals from a British author more popular than her: Agatha Christie. Potter books are - for the most part - plotted like murder mysteries: Whodunnit? (also How'd They Do It? and Why'd They Do It?) Who's stealing the Philosopher's Stone? Who opened the Chamber of Secrets? Why after 13 years is Sirius Black coming after Harry Potter now (or is he...?), and how is he doing it? Who really betrayed Harry's parents to Voldemort? Who put Harry's name in the Goblet of Fire? What's Voldemort want with the Department of Mysteries? Who is the Half-Blood Prince? What are Horcruxes? And the most important question of all: When will Josh and Donna make out? Oh wait wrong fanfic obsession... And that was resolved halfway through Season 7 anywho, but I digress.
Last but not least, the real reason Harry Potter sparked so much interest: Rowling followed the basic rules and plotlines of the Monomyth. And while Joseph Campbell's critics can argue that over-reliance of the monomyth as simple plot structure has led to a lot of crappy fiction, you can't argue when it's done right (Star Wars, the Matrix, even Star Trek). And Rowling gets it right. It also doesn't hurt that she follows a lot of fantasy-themed elements set down in The Encyclopedia of Fantasy, a reference that was in the works just as she published the first Potter book.
She created foremost a world that is both mundane but magical. Obviously, she created a Hero (Harry Potter) but also loyal Companions (Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger) who provide the Hero with vital tools: Ron gives Harry access to the Weasley family who act as advocates and guides to a Wizarding world he's unfamiliar with (as well as providing a surrogate home the Burrows) while allowing Ron opportunities to shine separately from his successful older brothers; Hermione provides knowledge and problem-solving skills that otherwise would lay dormant. There are additional Companions as well, notable among them Hagrid, Neville Longbottom and Luna Lovegood. Harry has his Mentor in Albus Dumbledore, although Remus Lupin and later Sirius Black provide Mentoring as well. And there's the Pariah Elite formed as the Order of the Phoenix, the wizard resistance formed to fight Voldemort and his Death Eater minions. And Snape... I'm tempted to place him as a Threshold Guardian, but arguably as the most complex character Rowling created pinning Snape down to any one Role is tricky. One more obviously is that Rowling created a Dark Lord (literally) in Tom Marvolo Riddle AKA Lord Voldemort, who threatened both Wizarding and Muggle worlds (The Land) with Plight... and like all Dark Lords he may be powerful but can be maddeningly blind to obvious flaws in his various plans to rule/destroy the world. Voldemort violates Rule 6 nearly every book he appears. Sheesh. Oddly enough, Voldemort never evens tries to violate "Rule 34. I will not turn into a snake. It never helps."
With the pieces in place, she follows most if not all of the monomyth rules faithfully: the Call to Adventure comes with that first letter from Hogwarts (addressed to the abused Harry's "Cupboard Under the Stairs"). The Refusal of the Call isn't Harry's fault: his aunt and uncle despise Wizardy and hoped by abusing Harry they would crush it out of him. Supernatural Aid comes via Hagrid who ensures the Call to Adventure is heeded, and Hagrid is the first to escort Harry into the Wizarding World (Diagon Alley) and help him locate tools (Wand, Owl, School Supplies) to assist in his survival. The Crossing the First Threshold and the beginning of the Road of Trials are basically Harry's first journey to his new school Hogwarts, during which he meets his Companions (Ron, Hermione and Neville) as well as Enemy/obstacle Draco Malfoy who acts as a bully and minor threat for most of the overall series. Draco is merely a representative of the True Threat Voldemort, reflecting Voldemort's bigotry and sadism but unable to truly achieve the malice of his Dark Lord. Past this, the book series is replete with Thresholds to pass and overcome, and various Belly of the Whales that Harry must survive: Entering the final chamber to confront the person stealing the Sorceror's Stone; Entering the Chamber of Secrets to save Ginny; Entering the Shrieking Shack to save Ron and confront Sirius Black (and the Truth and Atonement with the Father that Sirius represents); Entering a labyrinth that would lead to Voldemort and the Death Eaters at the end of the Third Trial of the Triwizard Tournament; Entering the Department of Mysteries to rescue Sirius Black but instead facing a trap; Entering Tom Riddle's childhood cave to recover a Horcrux; and with the last novel Entering an otherwise impenetrable goblin bank to steal a Horcrux, Entering the Room of Requirement to locate another Horcrux, and Entering the Forbidden Forest to finally confront his own Death (?) at Voldemort's hand. That's a lotta whale bellies.
There's Apotheosis with Harry's self-sacrifice at Voldemort's hand in the final book, but that leads to the Boon, the wisdom and knowledge gained in the Afterlife. With the Boon (knowledge that Harry is no longer a Horcrux, and the realization that Voldemort doesn't have true mastery of the Elder Wand) Harry considers for a moment the Refusal to Return, then acknowledges he must Return to bestow the Boon to everyone else by destroying Voldemort once and for all. He returns to the mundane world but is Master of Two Worlds (the World of Magic and the World of the Afterlife), and exults in his Freedom to Live by showing he was and remains unafraid of Death, unlike Voldemort who fears Death and is destroyed by his own Killing curse.
There's probably a more detailed way (probably a whole book) of fitting the Harry Potter series into the Monomyth structure (I didn't even touch on the Goddess stuff), but the point is Potter-as-Monomyth works. And despite all the complaints about the Monomyth, it DOES create easily-read, easily-recognizable tales that appeal across the broad spectrum of storytelling (well, at least within Western/Eurocentric Literature). That's why Harry Potter got to be so popular 10 years ago, and why it's still popular today, and why it may yet remain popular 100 years from now.
Thursday, July 9, 2009
After the 4th of July...
...It's downhill to Christmas and New Year's from here.
Where does the time go? Oh, right.
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz... snore... zzzzzzzzzzzzzz
With a movie en route, Harry Potter post forthcoming.
Where does the time go? Oh, right.
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz... snore... zzzzzzzzzzzzzz
With a movie en route, Harry Potter post forthcoming.
Thursday, May 7, 2009
Geek Days Are Here Again - Trekkie Edition
I've mentioned elsewhere how much of a Geek I am. Tomorrow will be a day I get my Geek on, a special day, a red-letter day.
One, it's my birthday. Two, it's the release of the Star Trek: The Reboot movie.
I need to note how much of a cornerstone Trek is to the Geek culture. There are a slew of different Geeks in the world - Tech Geeks, Anime Geeks, History Geeks, Political Geeks, High Fantasy Geeks (LotR geekdom started years before Trek did), Sports Geeks - and in some ways Trek touches upon them all. Fans of the West Wing noticed how the show brought out the scifi Geek in them and duh it's just Star Trek In the Oval Office, with Bartlet as Kirk, Leo as Spock, CJ as Uhura, Josh Sam and Toby as Scotty Sulu and/or Chekov, and Donna as Yeoman Rand (with the Republicans as Klingons). And the inverse of that is how the Original Series came as a parable of the Cold War era, the utopian ideal of JFK's New Frontier, with Starfleet as the West, Klingons as Russians, Romulans as Chinese. Star Trek VI is practically a Trek revisionism to the collapse of the Soviet Union: Praxis' explosion as Chernobyl, Gorkon as Gorbachev (destabilized via coup rather than assassinated), script filled with quoted references to Cold War dialog (my twin brother at this point still doesn't get the "Only Nixon Could Go to China" reference), the Khitomer Accords akin to the opening up of Eastern Europe and the Fall of the Berlin Wall.
Everything else in Geek culture owes something to Star Trek. Even Star Wars, a cultural behemoth in its own right. Trek was the first science fiction show to have dedicated conventions that actually got noticed (usually mocked from the 70s to the 90s) as a cultural phenom in their own right. Trek made geeking out over Tolkien and Hobbits more high-brow (snerk): before Trek, obsessing over Middle-earth was something kept to university coffee houses and halfling-weed-scented basements. Trek culture meshed and still meshes with Superhero Comics culture. Quoting from Trek is now so common people don't even blink or snicker when they do. Wearing Trek outfits outside of movie theaters and convention halls doesn't seem so weird anymore. We've even got serious (well as serious as current circumstances allow them) political commentators noting how much Obama is like Spock (that Obama shows signs of being an unabashed Geek (only a Geek would pose like that in front of a Superman statue) in his own right helps)... and that supposedly humorous Onion article that posits the BSG finale got Obama emotionally distraught? Probably was more accurate than the satirists thought... but I digress.
People who wouldn't even think of themselves as hardcore Trekkies or even hardcore Geeks could still quote heavily from the series magnum opus, Wrath of Khan - and not just Shatner's overemotive "KHHHHAAAAANNNNNN!" I'm talking knowing what a Kobayashi Maru is, that the Klingons have a proverb about revenge being a dish best served cold, that Ricardo Montalban didn't wear a chest prothesis for that outfit (yeah ladies, Mr. Rourke was BUFF).
Normal people know how to pronounce "nuclear wessels." People driving 90 MPH on the highway get pulled over by cops telling them they're speeding over Warp Factor 9. Regular people know Sulu got married... well, yeah, still don't know how he's gonna squeeze out a daughter though... Shakespeare is getting translated (back) into the original Klingon. Doctor Who knows of Spock as a TV character (which ruined the hell out of all those damn epic Crossover fanfic stories that had the Enterprise crew Trekkin with the Doctor! NOOOOO).
This is the Internet Age. Brought to you by computer nerds, bringing you information over the tubes, fashioning all Internet Traditions. And don't forget all those engineering techheads who designed mobile phones. Of course Star Trek is going to be all over this place. Soon, all will be Trek.
(Flashes the Vulcan greeting). Party Hard, fanboys!
One, it's my birthday. Two, it's the release of the Star Trek: The Reboot movie.
I need to note how much of a cornerstone Trek is to the Geek culture. There are a slew of different Geeks in the world - Tech Geeks, Anime Geeks, History Geeks, Political Geeks, High Fantasy Geeks (LotR geekdom started years before Trek did), Sports Geeks - and in some ways Trek touches upon them all. Fans of the West Wing noticed how the show brought out the scifi Geek in them and duh it's just Star Trek In the Oval Office, with Bartlet as Kirk, Leo as Spock, CJ as Uhura, Josh Sam and Toby as Scotty Sulu and/or Chekov, and Donna as Yeoman Rand (with the Republicans as Klingons). And the inverse of that is how the Original Series came as a parable of the Cold War era, the utopian ideal of JFK's New Frontier, with Starfleet as the West, Klingons as Russians, Romulans as Chinese. Star Trek VI is practically a Trek revisionism to the collapse of the Soviet Union: Praxis' explosion as Chernobyl, Gorkon as Gorbachev (destabilized via coup rather than assassinated), script filled with quoted references to Cold War dialog (my twin brother at this point still doesn't get the "Only Nixon Could Go to China" reference), the Khitomer Accords akin to the opening up of Eastern Europe and the Fall of the Berlin Wall.
Everything else in Geek culture owes something to Star Trek. Even Star Wars, a cultural behemoth in its own right. Trek was the first science fiction show to have dedicated conventions that actually got noticed (usually mocked from the 70s to the 90s) as a cultural phenom in their own right. Trek made geeking out over Tolkien and Hobbits more high-brow (snerk): before Trek, obsessing over Middle-earth was something kept to university coffee houses and halfling-weed-scented basements. Trek culture meshed and still meshes with Superhero Comics culture. Quoting from Trek is now so common people don't even blink or snicker when they do. Wearing Trek outfits outside of movie theaters and convention halls doesn't seem so weird anymore. We've even got serious (well as serious as current circumstances allow them) political commentators noting how much Obama is like Spock (that Obama shows signs of being an unabashed Geek (only a Geek would pose like that in front of a Superman statue) in his own right helps)... and that supposedly humorous Onion article that posits the BSG finale got Obama emotionally distraught? Probably was more accurate than the satirists thought... but I digress.
People who wouldn't even think of themselves as hardcore Trekkies or even hardcore Geeks could still quote heavily from the series magnum opus, Wrath of Khan - and not just Shatner's overemotive "KHHHHAAAAANNNNNN!" I'm talking knowing what a Kobayashi Maru is, that the Klingons have a proverb about revenge being a dish best served cold, that Ricardo Montalban didn't wear a chest prothesis for that outfit (yeah ladies, Mr. Rourke was BUFF).
Normal people know how to pronounce "nuclear wessels." People driving 90 MPH on the highway get pulled over by cops telling them they're speeding over Warp Factor 9. Regular people know Sulu got married... well, yeah, still don't know how he's gonna squeeze out a daughter though... Shakespeare is getting translated (back) into the original Klingon. Doctor Who knows of Spock as a TV character (which ruined the hell out of all those damn epic Crossover fanfic stories that had the Enterprise crew Trekkin with the Doctor! NOOOOO).
This is the Internet Age. Brought to you by computer nerds, bringing you information over the tubes, fashioning all Internet Traditions. And don't forget all those engineering techheads who designed mobile phones. Of course Star Trek is going to be all over this place. Soon, all will be Trek.
(Flashes the Vulcan greeting). Party Hard, fanboys!
Saturday, April 25, 2009
NFL Draft Day Blogging 2009
Hola, to all three people who might even know this blog exists. :)
Today's a huge day for me as a Bucs fan, I'm gonna be following the NFL rookie draft this afternoon. I'm gonna see about liveblogging it, which means constant EDIT updates to this particular post. I'm gonna see if I can do it, and how many updates I can do before the computer decides to kill me for overloading its CPU...
Some notes beforehand, I've made my predictions (based mostly on the Bucs NOT trading down from the 19th spot, something they're hoping to do) and am now waiting to see how far off I am in mah guesswork.
I'm primarily hoping the Bucs go for Percy Harvin as a need pick for WR. But I'm not blind to the Bucs' needs at DT and DE, so if the team goes there (possibly DT Peria Jerry) I won't have any problems.
What I will have a problem with is if the Bucs go with selecting a rookie QB like Josh Freeman with the 19th overall pick. Half the scouting boards (including that pompous ass Mel Kiper) have the Bucs going that way even though 1) Bucs have a decent roster of veteran QBs already and 2) Bucs have needs elsewhere. These jokers can't even argue that picking Freeman would be a Best-Available Pick (as opposed to Filling-Need Pick) because Freeman is ranked around the 50th spot with most scouting boards. These scouts seem to think the Bucs are screwed at QB because they don't like Leftwich or McCown or Griese. Phooey on that.
Early notes: Detroit has locked up the first overall pick to QB Dennis Quaid, uh Matt Stafford. Teams looking to trade up include the Giants who are hoping to snag WR Darrius Heyward-Bey before he goes to other WR-starved teams. Arizona has WR Boldin on the trading block, and apparently are dropping their demands so much that a smart team could snag Boldin, keep a decent early pick and still get a rookie they wanted. So DON'T expect the Bucs to make that move. ;-)
Draft officially starts in 4 hours. I will post UPDATES! Stay tuned.
Update - 3:42 PM. Currently at a Buffalo Wild Wings. Wireless works. Laptop now on battery power. See how long it lasts.
Most of the talk on the car radio was on the ridiculously rich contract Stafford got, and for the locals arguing about the need to trade down with the two teams most wanting to trade up (Arizona, NYGiants).
4:52 - Big shock with the Jets trading up to get Sanchez. Big question now is how this affects the next QB on the list (Freeman). With DE Jackson going ahead of other big names at the DE spot, there's a possibility the DE lineup will see a lot of activity with the next 12 spots...
5:37 - Didn't realize Denver needed RB. Wonder if the Bucs have a shot at LB Cushing... Biggest shock so far is still the Jets trade, but seeing some of the DEs slip from Top 5 to tenth and eleventh means there'll be more defensive end players on the board to tempt the Bucs...
6:01 - I call riot. FREEMAN?!?! WE TRADED UP FOR FREEMAN?!?!?! WE NEEDED DT! WE NEEDED WR!! WE COULD HAVE TAKEN OLB FOR GODS SAKE!!!!! GAHHHHHHHHH!!!!
It's official. We suck.
9:00 - I doubt the Bucs can work out a trade to get back into the Second Round, so this is it for the day. My grand experiment in liveblogging the event kinda goes nowhere and I end up frustrated with the team once again. Sigh. It's a good thing there's a Star Trek movie coming out on my birthday I can geek out over in two weeks...
Today's a huge day for me as a Bucs fan, I'm gonna be following the NFL rookie draft this afternoon. I'm gonna see about liveblogging it, which means constant EDIT updates to this particular post. I'm gonna see if I can do it, and how many updates I can do before the computer decides to kill me for overloading its CPU...
Some notes beforehand, I've made my predictions (based mostly on the Bucs NOT trading down from the 19th spot, something they're hoping to do) and am now waiting to see how far off I am in mah guesswork.
I'm primarily hoping the Bucs go for Percy Harvin as a need pick for WR. But I'm not blind to the Bucs' needs at DT and DE, so if the team goes there (possibly DT Peria Jerry) I won't have any problems.
What I will have a problem with is if the Bucs go with selecting a rookie QB like Josh Freeman with the 19th overall pick. Half the scouting boards (including that pompous ass Mel Kiper) have the Bucs going that way even though 1) Bucs have a decent roster of veteran QBs already and 2) Bucs have needs elsewhere. These jokers can't even argue that picking Freeman would be a Best-Available Pick (as opposed to Filling-Need Pick) because Freeman is ranked around the 50th spot with most scouting boards. These scouts seem to think the Bucs are screwed at QB because they don't like Leftwich or McCown or Griese. Phooey on that.
Early notes: Detroit has locked up the first overall pick to QB Dennis Quaid, uh Matt Stafford. Teams looking to trade up include the Giants who are hoping to snag WR Darrius Heyward-Bey before he goes to other WR-starved teams. Arizona has WR Boldin on the trading block, and apparently are dropping their demands so much that a smart team could snag Boldin, keep a decent early pick and still get a rookie they wanted. So DON'T expect the Bucs to make that move. ;-)
Draft officially starts in 4 hours. I will post UPDATES! Stay tuned.
Update - 3:42 PM. Currently at a Buffalo Wild Wings. Wireless works. Laptop now on battery power. See how long it lasts.
Most of the talk on the car radio was on the ridiculously rich contract Stafford got, and for the locals arguing about the need to trade down with the two teams most wanting to trade up (Arizona, NYGiants).
4:52 - Big shock with the Jets trading up to get Sanchez. Big question now is how this affects the next QB on the list (Freeman). With DE Jackson going ahead of other big names at the DE spot, there's a possibility the DE lineup will see a lot of activity with the next 12 spots...
5:37 - Didn't realize Denver needed RB. Wonder if the Bucs have a shot at LB Cushing... Biggest shock so far is still the Jets trade, but seeing some of the DEs slip from Top 5 to tenth and eleventh means there'll be more defensive end players on the board to tempt the Bucs...
6:01 - I call riot. FREEMAN?!?! WE TRADED UP FOR FREEMAN?!?!?! WE NEEDED DT! WE NEEDED WR!! WE COULD HAVE TAKEN OLB FOR GODS SAKE!!!!! GAHHHHHHHHH!!!!
It's official. We suck.
9:00 - I doubt the Bucs can work out a trade to get back into the Second Round, so this is it for the day. My grand experiment in liveblogging the event kinda goes nowhere and I end up frustrated with the team once again. Sigh. It's a good thing there's a Star Trek movie coming out on my birthday I can geek out over in two weeks...
Saturday, April 18, 2009
So I obsess over a few things
I'm a geek. You might not have noticed by now but... yeah I kid. All four of you noticed on Day One.
I'm a comic book geek, movie geek, scifi geek, Trekkie (yes, I accept the term), XPhile, lit geek, cat geek, cheese geek, tall-long-haired-brunette-with-huge-tracks-of-land geek (I have a fetish, so? especially if she looks great in a Wonder Woman cosplay uniform), and sports geek.
I know that last bit sometimes doesn't square with all the other geekdoms - well other than the cheese and the tall brunettes with yabbos geekdoms - but, yeah, I get it from my mom's side of the family (poor Grampa was a Cubs (or was it teh Braves?) fan, Mom knows ever syllable of the War Eagle fight song). And having grown up in the Tampa Bay region from 1977 on, I got hooked early to the Tampa Bay Bucs pro football team (having them go to the playoffs when I was nine started the fan crush). So yeah, I follow a lot of football, college and pro.
I also obsess over the annual NFL rookie draft.
Not everyone gets the draft, I know. It's a hyped-up non-event in their eyes. No game is actually played out. No one really wins, or really loses (unless you're the Browns or Lions or Raiders, they haven't drafted smart in years!). It's a real-life version of Fantasy Football where REAL team owners get to select newbies to fill out their rosters, nothing more.
Except, except, except... There's a reason thousands of fans do follow Draft Day, or at least the First Round.
How the teams draft can tell you how the coaches and owners are thinking about their team's chances for the coming season. Who a team drafts can tell fans what to expect, what holes in the team line-ups needed to be filled. Like a few other team sports (baseball and hockey for example), pro football has a whole line-up of diversified player positions that require specific skills, so a team drafting a Wide Receiver with their first overall pick is telling fans they're trying to upgrade their passing attack. Like basketball, football draftees can immediately see playing time on the field their rookie year (baseball and hockey both have farm systems in which rookies can hide for years before seeing pro-level play time), so a top draft pick can become an immediate star first game of September.
Another thing is that NFL Draft Day is a time when both the college level fandom and pro level fandom intermix. College football fanaticism is actually bigger than the pro game (more schools, more regions, more history), and not all college fans are pro fans (and vice versa). Draft Day is when fans from Wake Forest can gather to watch a top-rated Defensive linesman can get taken by the Green Bay Packers, or the Oakland Raiders, or the Cincinnati Bengals (poor guy) or the New York Jets (whose fans will boo him anyway. Lord, those guys would boo the Pope if they could).
Draft Day IS a day for the fans, because it gives fans a chance to gather at local watering holes (or at a team's draft party, or AT the draft in New York City itself) and bicker and whoop and praise and curse the team they follow.
It's a HUGE day for me, because like I told you earlier the Bucs are mah team. And from 1984 to 1996, the Draft Day was really the only real fun day a Bucs fan could have, trust me we were THAT bad a franchise those years. So yeah, I'm into the draft.
This April 25th, I hope to gather with a few Bucs fans in the bay area (perhaps Oldsmar, there's a Buffalo Wild Wings there that might have wifi handy), and maybe even liveblog it from this blog. Hope you don't mind... but it's not like I've got a lot of reasons to write about librarianship these days...
I'm a comic book geek, movie geek, scifi geek, Trekkie (yes, I accept the term), XPhile, lit geek, cat geek, cheese geek, tall-long-haired-brunette-with-huge-tracks-of-land geek (I have a fetish, so? especially if she looks great in a Wonder Woman cosplay uniform), and sports geek.
I know that last bit sometimes doesn't square with all the other geekdoms - well other than the cheese and the tall brunettes with yabbos geekdoms - but, yeah, I get it from my mom's side of the family (poor Grampa was a Cubs (or was it teh Braves?) fan, Mom knows ever syllable of the War Eagle fight song). And having grown up in the Tampa Bay region from 1977 on, I got hooked early to the Tampa Bay Bucs pro football team (having them go to the playoffs when I was nine started the fan crush). So yeah, I follow a lot of football, college and pro.
I also obsess over the annual NFL rookie draft.
Not everyone gets the draft, I know. It's a hyped-up non-event in their eyes. No game is actually played out. No one really wins, or really loses (unless you're the Browns or Lions or Raiders, they haven't drafted smart in years!). It's a real-life version of Fantasy Football where REAL team owners get to select newbies to fill out their rosters, nothing more.
Except, except, except... There's a reason thousands of fans do follow Draft Day, or at least the First Round.
How the teams draft can tell you how the coaches and owners are thinking about their team's chances for the coming season. Who a team drafts can tell fans what to expect, what holes in the team line-ups needed to be filled. Like a few other team sports (baseball and hockey for example), pro football has a whole line-up of diversified player positions that require specific skills, so a team drafting a Wide Receiver with their first overall pick is telling fans they're trying to upgrade their passing attack. Like basketball, football draftees can immediately see playing time on the field their rookie year (baseball and hockey both have farm systems in which rookies can hide for years before seeing pro-level play time), so a top draft pick can become an immediate star first game of September.
Another thing is that NFL Draft Day is a time when both the college level fandom and pro level fandom intermix. College football fanaticism is actually bigger than the pro game (more schools, more regions, more history), and not all college fans are pro fans (and vice versa). Draft Day is when fans from Wake Forest can gather to watch a top-rated Defensive linesman can get taken by the Green Bay Packers, or the Oakland Raiders, or the Cincinnati Bengals (poor guy) or the New York Jets (whose fans will boo him anyway. Lord, those guys would boo the Pope if they could).
Draft Day IS a day for the fans, because it gives fans a chance to gather at local watering holes (or at a team's draft party, or AT the draft in New York City itself) and bicker and whoop and praise and curse the team they follow.
It's a HUGE day for me, because like I told you earlier the Bucs are mah team. And from 1984 to 1996, the Draft Day was really the only real fun day a Bucs fan could have, trust me we were THAT bad a franchise those years. So yeah, I'm into the draft.
This April 25th, I hope to gather with a few Bucs fans in the bay area (perhaps Oldsmar, there's a Buffalo Wild Wings there that might have wifi handy), and maybe even liveblog it from this blog. Hope you don't mind... but it's not like I've got a lot of reasons to write about librarianship these days...
Monday, April 13, 2009
Time flies when you're plugged in
It was ten years ago this month when The Matrix came out.
As a Gen-Xer who measures time by cultural milestones, this is yet another moment where I sit back and realize that DAMN I'm getting old. My 20-year high school reunion kinda worked the same way.
How can I describe 1999 (or 1985 for God's sake) to those who weren't there? That was a crazy-ass year. Everyone, well every geek, was waiting for Star Wars I - The Phantom Menace to come out that summer: a brand-new website called Countingdown.com was practically created to flash a timer waiting for the day we'd see Anakin Skywalker start on his destiny. The only summer film that looked to compete with the Force was this Austin Powers sequel. There was this buzz about a small indy project called the Blair Witch Project that had this weird-ass website of background info. Meanwhile in the real world, politics was getting all screwy with the Clinton Impeachment over Blowjobs fiasco that was wiping out Republican leadership instead of the Clintons themselves. Bush and Gore were lining themselves up as the de-facto party choices for 2000. There were Melissa Worms and Napster and everyone waiting for Y2K to erupt on New Year's. Stephen King nearly dies in a hit-and-run accident. Enron starts messing with California's energy supply. And on April 20, 1999... that was a bad day all around.
Into all of this came The Matrix. For all we knew or heard about this film, it had something to do with computer hackers figuring out something, not sure what, about the universe and reality in general. Nobody I knew who were into films had much information on what this was about. Warner Bros. was kinda releasing this film with almost little fanfare, in early April of all times rather than the more lucrative summer months as though they wanted it done and out of the way before Star Wars cleaned up the market.
For meself... Two hours after going in, for myself, every geek I know, and every geek I knew existed out there on the planet, had to have exited that film with OUR FREAKING MINDS BLOWN!
It had hackers saving the world (nice ego-stroking there). It had questions about reality, about our senses, our perceptions. It had proto-goth culture mixed with techno-shoot-em-up culture mixed with Far Eastern mysticism and every form of kung-fu (Jedi, wire-fu, gun-fu, hack-fu, wtf-fu) you had ever seen. It had Christian parables and messanic overtones. It had Keanu Reeves saying "Whoa" and actually SELLING THAT LINE! It had Hugo Weaving owning the title of "Badass" (even in good-guy roles like Elrond!) for the next decade (would half the people who even moderately tolerated V For Vendetta even been that way if it didn't have Hugo Weaving's near-perfect dark voice as the anti-hero?). It had Laurence Fishburne as Morpheus, out-mentoring Yoda in some of the best kung-fu sparring you'll ever see. It had Joey Pants as the one sensible jerk in the whole universe ("Why didn't I take the Blue Pill?"), who of course turns out to be a total -ssh-l- because in a war against the Machine you need to accept the Red Pill and accept the reality that we are all brains in batteries.
Those who came after this movie came out can't begin to understand how the Matrix warped our geekhood. We came to quote from Morpheus and the Oracle more than Yoda. It also hurt that when the Phantom Menace finally came out - Jar-Jar??? Mitichlor-whats? Anakin crushing on Padme even though he's clearly 8 years away from hitting puberty? What??? - that a lot of geeks felt betrayed (ten years later, IT STILL HURTS) by Lucas' lack of understanding his own vision (the geeky response of The Phantom Edit tells you all you needed to know: if only Lucas had the supporting staff he had back during the 70s-80s trilogy, people like Gary Kurtz at producer and Lawrence Kasdan at screenplay who could have pulled back on Lucas' worst indulgences, the prequel trilogy could have been SO AWESOME).
So here we are, 10 years later. I'm getting to 39 years old, plugged into a computer messing with blogging and Facebook and a bunch of other things other than having an actual, you know, social life, pretty much like the USENET threads and emailing of days past. Has anything really changed?
Oh, and there's a rebooted Star Trek movie coming out. Gasp drool worship. Some things definitely never change...
As a Gen-Xer who measures time by cultural milestones, this is yet another moment where I sit back and realize that DAMN I'm getting old. My 20-year high school reunion kinda worked the same way.
How can I describe 1999 (or 1985 for God's sake) to those who weren't there? That was a crazy-ass year. Everyone, well every geek, was waiting for Star Wars I - The Phantom Menace to come out that summer: a brand-new website called Countingdown.com was practically created to flash a timer waiting for the day we'd see Anakin Skywalker start on his destiny. The only summer film that looked to compete with the Force was this Austin Powers sequel. There was this buzz about a small indy project called the Blair Witch Project that had this weird-ass website of background info. Meanwhile in the real world, politics was getting all screwy with the Clinton Impeachment over Blowjobs fiasco that was wiping out Republican leadership instead of the Clintons themselves. Bush and Gore were lining themselves up as the de-facto party choices for 2000. There were Melissa Worms and Napster and everyone waiting for Y2K to erupt on New Year's. Stephen King nearly dies in a hit-and-run accident. Enron starts messing with California's energy supply. And on April 20, 1999... that was a bad day all around.
Into all of this came The Matrix. For all we knew or heard about this film, it had something to do with computer hackers figuring out something, not sure what, about the universe and reality in general. Nobody I knew who were into films had much information on what this was about. Warner Bros. was kinda releasing this film with almost little fanfare, in early April of all times rather than the more lucrative summer months as though they wanted it done and out of the way before Star Wars cleaned up the market.
For meself... Two hours after going in, for myself, every geek I know, and every geek I knew existed out there on the planet, had to have exited that film with OUR FREAKING MINDS BLOWN!
It had hackers saving the world (nice ego-stroking there). It had questions about reality, about our senses, our perceptions. It had proto-goth culture mixed with techno-shoot-em-up culture mixed with Far Eastern mysticism and every form of kung-fu (Jedi, wire-fu, gun-fu, hack-fu, wtf-fu) you had ever seen. It had Christian parables and messanic overtones. It had Keanu Reeves saying "Whoa" and actually SELLING THAT LINE! It had Hugo Weaving owning the title of "Badass" (even in good-guy roles like Elrond!) for the next decade (would half the people who even moderately tolerated V For Vendetta even been that way if it didn't have Hugo Weaving's near-perfect dark voice as the anti-hero?). It had Laurence Fishburne as Morpheus, out-mentoring Yoda in some of the best kung-fu sparring you'll ever see. It had Joey Pants as the one sensible jerk in the whole universe ("Why didn't I take the Blue Pill?"), who of course turns out to be a total -ssh-l- because in a war against the Machine you need to accept the Red Pill and accept the reality that we are all brains in batteries.
Those who came after this movie came out can't begin to understand how the Matrix warped our geekhood. We came to quote from Morpheus and the Oracle more than Yoda. It also hurt that when the Phantom Menace finally came out - Jar-Jar??? Mitichlor-whats? Anakin crushing on Padme even though he's clearly 8 years away from hitting puberty? What??? - that a lot of geeks felt betrayed (ten years later, IT STILL HURTS) by Lucas' lack of understanding his own vision (the geeky response of The Phantom Edit tells you all you needed to know: if only Lucas had the supporting staff he had back during the 70s-80s trilogy, people like Gary Kurtz at producer and Lawrence Kasdan at screenplay who could have pulled back on Lucas' worst indulgences, the prequel trilogy could have been SO AWESOME).
So here we are, 10 years later. I'm getting to 39 years old, plugged into a computer messing with blogging and Facebook and a bunch of other things other than having an actual, you know, social life, pretty much like the USENET threads and emailing of days past. Has anything really changed?
Oh, and there's a rebooted Star Trek movie coming out. Gasp drool worship. Some things definitely never change...
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