I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately and I’ve decided it’s time for another photoshoot. Last time, we went with the classic Princess Leia Gold Bikini cause how could you not? It’s, like I said, a classic. But this time I figured I should get you all into the mix. The first step is to figure out which costume you want to see me in, then we’ll do the whole fundraising shtick like we did last time.
Now, I’ve culled through my mind all the different options and picked out the five I’d be most comfortable wearing this time around. Take a look, tell me what you think in the comments here or on my Facebook page. Bear in mind though, I will be asking for monetary based support on this as I am not made of money honeys. And please also remember, with my size boobs I’ll probably have to get the larger size. 🙂 I’ll let you know which one I’ve picked next week.
Why was this never read to me as a child? (Borrowed form College Humor) http://www.collegehumor.com/article:1811404
This past Friday, HNG fan James posed a seemingly simple and obvious question to me:
Huh.
That is an excellent questions James, and believe it or not, one I’ve never really thought about. Science fiction has been such a constant in my life since I was a small child that I never stopped to think about what my definition of science fiction is.
When you think about it, it’s a pretty broad term that can be applied to just about any story. After all, most humans are cyborgs in one way or another. For example, everyone who wears glasses, has braces or uses a pace maker is technically a cyborg.
So does that mean that every movie with a computer in it can claim to be science fiction?
science fiction (noun):fiction dealing principally with the impact of actual or imagined science on society or individuals or having a scientific factor as an essential orienting component.
By this definition, a movie about a kid who mixes the wrong chemicals in chemistry class and accidentally blows up his classroom could be considered science fiction. After all, his mistake has impacted his society of classmates in a scientific way. Would I consider this science fiction? Probably not.
Science fictionis a genre of fiction dealing with the impact of imagined innovations in science or technology, often in a futuristic setting.
Science fiction differs from fantasy in that it is based in reality. That may sound bizarre but it’s true. We take what we know to be real, say…the internet, and transplant it into an imaginative situation, such as The Matrix, to get a fictional story with some basis in truth.
Computers were a relatively new concept when Gene Roddenberry came up with his idea for a “wagon train to the stars.” While he was in the process of fine tuning his concept for Star Trek, he consulted with every scientist he could get his hands on in order to find out what technology was feasible. 45 years later, cell phones, scanning devices and hyposprays are so integrated into our everyday lives that these so-called “devices of the future” seem antiquated in comparison.
Science fiction can be subtle or glaringly obvious. Take the subject of clones, for example. One on hand, you have The Island, a futuristic clone farm where everyone is forced to wear white and cannot leave the confines of the compound for fear of deadly pathogens. When their organs are needed by their wealthy sponsors, the clones are told that they’ve won a lottery that will allow them to live the rest of their lives on an island free of the toxic air. The protagonists escape and fight for their freedom and right to exist.
At the other end of the spectrum is Never Let Me Go, about a group of cloned children growing up at a boarding school in England. They live relatively normal lives until a teacher lets it slip that they have been cloned for the purpose of organ donation. As adults they are allowed to come and go as they please but they are resigned to their fate. Only Tommy attempts to change his destiny and he does so by creating art. When that fails he accepts his lot in life and “completes” his purpose. These two movies essentially have the exact same concept but they treat the topic with completely different approaches. Are they both science fiction?
I have to say yes. Cloning is a reality but scientists haven’t reached the point (that we know of) of cloning humans which elevates both tales to the realm of science fiction.
Science fiction doesn’t have to be set in the future but it sure helps.
Firefly is essentially a Western, it just happens to be set in the future where spaceships are as common as horses. Take the spaceships away and it ceases to be science fiction. Take the spaceships and aliens out of Star Trek and you have NCIS.
My best attempt at dressing like Malcolm Reynolds from "Firefly". Anyone think they can Photoshop me into a cooler background?
You get the picture.
So to answer your question James, my definition of science fiction is a story that takes a reality and manipulates it through science, technology and imagination to make something completely unique and exceptionally awesome.
And I’ll take it over real life any day.
Now here’s a question for you readers out there. Is there a hard line between science fiction and fantasy? Would something like “Farscape” be considered sci-fi, fantasy or sci-fi/fantasy?
You could copy Ten Forward, duplicate the bar on Tatooine or “cmd-c” any famous nerd bar but those would all just be facsimiles. And while they would be awesome, I thought it would be better if somehow a bar could be created that, while totally being a nerd bar, could just as easily pass as a normal bar. You can order beer, wine or a little Romulan Ale without beating people over the head with patrol Car 718’s night stick.
So here are a few things that I feel would be excellent subtle replacements for items you find in bars all around the world.
Sports Jersey: A lot of bars have jersey’s of famous players on their walls, right? So what kind of jersey would be in a nerd bar? Since we’re going for subtle I’m not sure how good it would be to have a Caprica Buccaneers jersey up there because it just seems too overt. I’m thinking we go with something reeeeeeally obscure. Like a Buck Bokai jersey perhaps? You can all name the episode of DS9 that it’s from right? Ok good 🙂
Weapon Above Fireplace: To replace a normal sword, how about a bat’leth or lightsaber? A shot-gun gets replaced by a clumsy blaster or phaser rifle? Or maybe, to get super cool we go with Duncan McClouds katana! That’s right. I dug so deep I hit Adrian Paul.
Drinks: As I said before, the alcohol would be important. Klingon Blood Wine maybe? Romulan ale? As long as they have Imperial Stormtrooper Stout on tap, I’m in.
Games: Obviously, it being a nerd bar and all, games will be offered to keep busy nerds buried in RPG or sci-fi minutiae. But what games, you ask? Obviously, some good d20’s would be for sale. And much like darts, if you want to borrow the bars dice you gotta leave your license with the bartender. It should also have assorted classic games like Pacman, Load Runner or Joust available. And if you’re really lucky, maybe even Galaga.
from http://inhabitat.com/pacman-dining-table/
Posters: now we’re moving into less subtle territory. A Starship Troopers poster would be way too obvious. But the ‘Firefly’ one below as well as some classics, like ‘Soylent Green’ or ‘Plan 9 from Outer Space’ I feel we could pull off without making normal folk feel weirded out. Especially since the ‘Serenity’ one is in German. Sci-five!
I am aware of the fact that I’ve been writing an awful lot about Firefly and Battlestar Galactica lately. There are two reasons for this:
1. I recently purchased every season of BSG and am treating myself to a personal marathon.
2. My Mom just had surgery and, as her weekend nurse I decided that, in my expert medical opinion, a Firefly marathon was necessary to her recovery.
(I may aso be mourning the death of the Help Nathan Buy Firefly movement…so sad)
This post stems from a conversation I had with my Mom over the weekend after we had watched a few episodes of FF. I was trying to explain to her why BSG should be her next marathon and was giving her short descriptions of the characters. Next thing I know she’s asking about Cally in the Firefly world. I asked if she meant Kaylee. She asked which one was the mechanic. I said both of them. She asked which one had been shot. I said both of them. She got very confused (the Vicodin may have contributed to that) and demanded to know who the heck was who and why they were so dang similar.
So I present to my Mom (and to you) Cally vs. Kaylee.
***
CALLY
Originally little more than a named extra, the producers liked Nicki Clyne so much that they decided to make Callandra Henderson (or Jane Cally, depending on where you’re at in the series) a full fledged character. The poor girl just wanted to be honorably discharged from the decommissioned Battlestar Galactica and go off to be a dentist. Instead she watched the vast majority of her civilization destroyed along with her dreams of oral hygiene. The moment I knew I liked her was when she fought off a criminal would-be rapist by biting off his ear. He shot her in the gut and that was supposed to be the end of Deckhand Cally.
Instead she went on to murder a Cylon (who used to have sex with her boss), get beat up (by her boss), knocked up (not by her boss), hitched (to her boss), almost executed (by the big boss) and then murdered (by a Cylon).
Even though Cally turns out to be not so great a person, I have a soft spot for her. I mean, seriously, the girl just wanted to be a dentist.
KAYLEE
A genius mechanic with no formal training, Kaywinnit Frye is the heart and soul of the Serenity crew. She’s pretty much open and honest about everything and jumps on the opportunity to take the mechanic job away from a guy right after jumping his bones. She accidentally gets shot in the gut by the most incompetent undercover cop ever and is saved by the soon-to-be ship’s doctor who bargains for safe passage with her life.
The poor girl somehow ends up being the brunt of the guy’s teasing, usually when she displays some behavior that proves she’s a woman under all that engine grease. Fortunately, the ladies come to her defense, most often in the form of mad dogging the guys. She develops a fat crush on the doc and even though he seems to like her too, he pretty much screws it up at every opportunity.
I liked Kaylee from the moment I saw her (how could you not??) I mean, seriously, the girl just wants to fix things and wear a frilly pink dress.
***
Ok, so let’s review here. Both are mechanics, both have unrequited crushes on fellow crew members that are eventually requited, both get shot in the stomach and that’s about where the similarities end.
But it’s understandable how someone doped up on pain meds would get the two confused.
Even as a Zombie, I can still work an iPhone… Girls are smarter than boys, even when we're undead 🙂
What do you give a girl who’s biggest fear is zombies?
Why, two Samurai swords, of course!
You may have read any number of zombie survival guides. I know I have. Because hey, the zombie apocalypse could TOTALLY happen. I have nightmares about it. I had one particular nightmare a while back: I was walking down the aisle of the church and everything seemed to be fine. Just as I reached the altar, zombies started swarming into the church. I was literally fighting zombies in a wedding dress with a candelabrum. This got me thinking. What do I really want/need in the event zombies start to take over our planet? Here is the list I came up with:
– Two Japanese swords (katana and tachi – although I would totally take a couple of tsurugi’s)
– Some grenades (in case I get surrounded)
– One really good pair of running shoes (uhm, self-explanatory)
– Five ponytail holders (in case some get lost and because rubber bands are really damaging to your hair)
– One water resistant watch (in case of rain, we all know zombies are impervious to water)
– One really amazing sports bra (YOU try running around with 34DD’s)
– Water purification tablets (alas, I doubt I’ll have easy access to my beloved Arrowhead)
– One pair of Maui Jim sports sunglasses (preferably with one of those landyards that hold them to your head)
– One baseball hat (can’t have sun in your eyes while you’re fighting the undead)
– As many MRE’s as I can carry in a light hiker’s backpack (they last FOREVER, my emergency MRE’s are from WWII)
Zombie family reunion
Now, I don’t know about you, but I don’t really believe in zombies that are dead people come back to life. I believe in the virus zombies. The kind where a virus gets out of control and infects everyone but the few unlucky immune who are left trying to save the planet and find a cure if they’re lucky. It’s pretty bleak but entirely possible. Just think of how many viruses and bacteria are being worked on, manipulated and created everyday in labs. Think of all the diseases that are mutating in nature. Think of the work being done in nano technology! Any one of these factors could result in a zombie apocalypse.
Why swords instead of guns? Guns run out of bullets. Swords don’t. Japanese swords tend to be lighter then their European and Middle Eastern counterparts. For a chick, that’s a good thing. Swords cut off heads. Zombies are hard to kill but it’s universally accepted that cutting off their heads will get the job done. They can be strapped to your back for easy two-handed access in a pinch but are still out of the way while walking and running. They can always be sharpened and won’t jam up when wet. They are easy to clean. They are bad ass.
I’ve got everything but the swords and the grenades.