Catholic news roundup: HHS, abortion and more

Well, this has been an interesting little month. Active readers to this blog know that I am the Catholic Examiner for Examiner.com.  Which means I basically report what people say. A lot. And there is a metric ton of stupid every day when it comes to subjects like "Catholics."

Seriously, I typed it in as a search term on Twitter a few times, it was like spelunking into a troll cave. And this month, it got even worse.  Or better, if you want to view it that way -- I got a lot of writing done.  However, while I usually have a Catholic review at the end of the month, this month already requires a massive column dump.

 It started simple. In Obama to churches: drop dead, I reported that the government program commonly known as Obamacare was going to be making Catholic churches pay for abortions, and sterilizations, and contraception, even though the church preaches that all of those are immoral.  And, since the first one was "Drop dead," I had to be a smartass and follow it up with Churches to Obama: and on the third day, we struck back. -- there is a petition against Obama's little mandate.. After that, I figured I should ask a common question -- didn't the church support Obama? And Obamacare?  Not only that, but wasn't Obama pro-abortion before he ran for the Oval office? So, I asked if the Church is still gullible after all these years? The next predictable FAQ ... why is the Catholic church against abortion, and contraception, and all the other stuff.  What is the big idea, after all?  So I had to call it the Catholic church, abortion, and natural law ... you'll see what I mean.

And then Nancy Pelosi earned her thirty pieces of silver ... in this case, she came out to stand with the Catholics ... who supported Obama, declaring it an act of courage to stand against the church. Let's just say I used The Princess Bride a lot. Given that this is consistent with her stance for her entire career, I had a lot of people asking if Pelosi was to be excommunicated.  It was a little sarcastic. Even my editor caught up on it.  

He who takes the Catholic vote takes the election. Guess who ... may not?  I ran some electoral math on the 2012 election. You might be surprised at the problems here.

After a while, as you can imagine, this got kinda stupid. And I was tired of all of it.  So, I discussed the Million-dollar ripoff of the New York archdiocese -- and you thought the priests were the problem. I then did a brief examination of Occupy wall street and the revenge of the Vatican ninjas -- just when you thought you were safe, huh? Then Proposition 8 was overturned -- my only note there is that it might be a little soon to pop the champagne.

Then the government did something stupid, and the Army censored the Catholic church over the issue of -- you guessed it -- Obamacare.  Oy.  

And then, Chris Matthews stood with Catholics against Obama ... and that was strange.  And what was even stranger? So were a lot of other people in the news media, and I covered that in my News roundup: Catholics and the HHS mandate.  Then, even  Rand Paul defended the Catholic church .... and he's not even Catholic!

Then, last Friday, there was a press conference.  I listened, then wondered: Has Obama compromised on churches? The answer .... probably not.  But you'll have to read that and decide it yourself.

Be well all.

Inspiring Authors: J. Michael Straczynski

Every once in a while, I look over my writing style, and I look at what I've taken away from the authors I've been exposed to.


The first, and most important writing influence is someone named J. Michael Straczynski (JMS).

JMS, who I have mentioned once or twice, was an executive producer on Murder, She wrote, created Babylon 5, and writes almost anything else he can get his hands on. He's written comics, TV, novels, science fiction, battling demons....

Just look him up on amazon, buy everything except for “Rising Stars” and “Supreme Power.”

I'm not joking. Go now.

If you saw Thor -- and who didn't? You didn't? Go see it. I'll wait..... Back now? You liked it? Good. -- JMS had a cameo in the film as the first fellow to find Thor's hammer, and organized that big sequence with trying to drag out the hammer with a truck.

There is Tribulations, a book about demonic possession in modern LA. Surprisingly well put together and very religious ... And he's an atheist. So, he at least knows how to appreciate religion, even if it's only for use as fantasy fodder.

I first experienced the writing of JMS a very long time ago, before I even knew who the man was. Originally an author for television, he worked his way up from cartoons and into prime time. He penned the only episode of The Real Ghostbusters that I can remember.  Twenty years after the original airing of Murder, She Wrote, all of the episodes I knew off the top of my head happened to be written by him (if you remember an episode in the Psycho house, that would be Joe).

I first became aware of Joe Straczynski with his television show Babylon 5; at the time, it seemed to be a rip-off of a Star Trek program that had just come on called Deep Space 9. Then odd things started happening. To start with, the show had character. The characters on the show had personalities. They had backgrounds. They had character flaws. When there was fighting, there were actual military tactics, and the science fiction .... had science.

If you are not a follower of science fiction, you may not be aware of this, but to find military tactics in most science fiction filmed media is almost as rare as finding science in a Star Trek film. As mentioned during our week of Infinite Space, Infinite God II, most sci-fi will resort to technobabble before using actual science. Babylon 5 is the first science fiction television show that ever explained how their artificial gravity worked.

With military tactics -- how much in the way of tactics did anyone see in Star Wars or Star Trek that did not amount to "Watch two armies. See them ram into each other. See them ignore that space is three dimensional."

With Babylon 5, NASA has asked permission to use some of their designs, because they can't come up with better ideas.  If you ever hear about a NASA space construction craft called a "Star Fury," it's because JMS allowed them to use it on the condition that it shared the name it had on the tv show....

Constant readers of this blog will see the fingerprints of JMS all over it. The most popular blog post Disasters to Marvel At was made possible by Joe Straczynski. After Babylon 5, JMS went on to writing comic books; in particular, Amazing Spider Man (ASM). Being a fan of Straczynski's, I followed. It was the first time I had picked up a comic book in about five years. At least.

And it was a gloriously enjoyable run. If you ever saw an issue of ASM that involved Spider-Man dealing with the 9-11 attacks, that was JMS' doing. It was a throwaway issue in a grand story arc that had Peter Parker questioning his own origins, pondering whether or not he was part of a larger plan, and finding himself embroiled more and more with supernatural problems. The solutions became more cerebral and scientific than requiring an ability to pound someone into dust.

Also, in pure JMS fashion, he took the marriage of Peter Parker and made it work -- after all, Straczynski's strong suit is having two people interact with each other. And it's nothing like having a reconciliation in the middle of a super-powered smackdown at Denver airport.

And then there was the surprisingly epic ASM 500, where JMS managed to condense the entire 500 isues before into one, simple question.

Which is why I was somewhat enraged when editorial mandate came down from a clear blue sky and decreed that every Marvel comic would be dragooned into the Event of the Week. The story arc for Straczynski's Spider-Man run was stomped on by the far inferior Civil War. And, while I liked what JMS managed to do with it, despite editorial mandate (it was the only part of the Civil War I remotely enjoyed), and he managed to make the follow-up Back in Black, a fun read, at the end of the day, management came down and destroyed, literally, every achievement JMS wrote over the course of his six-year run.

When I saw JMS at New York Comic Con, he had a running phrase: "Joe, you suck." He even had the audience repeat it back to him.  However, between the links above, there's a reason why I think it should be "Joe (Quesada), you suck."

JMS would also take over duties on Thor, where he placed the Norse deity in the middle of New Mexico (Thor movie fans, sound familiar?)

After Marvel and he had a falling out, he went direct to DC. He did some spectacular Team-ups of the Brave and the Bold, tried to work on a new arc for Wonder Woman, and even a Superman arc called Grounded. Right now, he's heading the bestseller list with his graphic novel Superman: Earth One.  If Warner Brothers is smart, they'll reboot the Superman movie franchise with Earth one as a model.

WHAT I LEARNED FROM JMS.

I learned how to write people. Taking a cue from Rod Serling, JMS knew how to make a conversation be dramatic with just two people in a room, no ticking bomb required. He knew how to work dynamics with different characters for different results. He even went so far to lock two people in a room together, he literally trapped two characters in an elevator.

If you wondered why my short story One Way to Stay out of Jail consisted mostly of two people in a room just talking to each other, you can probably guess. It's the joy of having characters (some of whom are deeply flawed) interacting with each other.

Another thing I got from JMS -- how to take cliche's and turn them inside out.

For example...

Situation: Two people who hate each other are trapped in an elevator; fires are burning outside. If they don't work together, they will die.
Hollywood standard procedure: The trapped duo will overcome their grievances in order to stay alive.
JMS: One character says to another "I'm not going to help. This way, I can watch you die and I won't be prosecuted."

It's fun.

In A Pius Man, there is a reason that the book has plenty of deep, in-depth conversations between people who have some obvious flaws .... although a lot of it revolves around Sean Ryan, who is, himself, really weird.

Further Reading.

Other works by JMS include.

Demon Night (I haven't read it yet, but it should be fun)



Othersyde: Another book I loved. High school, meet demonology 101.

Two high school nerds, "losers," tormented and tortured on a routine basis, buy curiosities -- two telegraph signal senders.

And then, the devices start tapping out Morse code on their own.

It was elegantly written, and even made the angst of high school tolerable. And, no, there is no Twilight level, whiny-angsty BS. I would take a power drill to my head before I even read anything remotely like it, to heck with recommending it.

Book of Lost Souls: A late, lamented comic book series JMS wrote while at Marvel. While there were only five issues of this run, I think it has a good, solid story arc. that reads well even though Marvel pulled the plug on it early on.

 Straczynski Unplugged: A collection of short stories, mostly novelized versions of screenplays JMS did for The New Twilight Zone back in the 80s. I can only assume these few were all he did, otherwise the show would have done much, much better. These were all awesome.

Under the heading of both "touching" and "I never saw this coming," was Silver Surfer: Requiem. The premise: the Silver Surfer originally made a devil's bargain to save his home planet, becoming the Surfer, herald to a planet-eating being called Galactus. Years later, the Silver Surfer's own body is turning against him. Everything that makes him the Surfer is breaking down. The story arc is broken down into four parts. Benedictus, Sanctus, Kyrie, and Agnus Dei. All parts of the funeral mass.

Let's put it this way: I never liked Silver Surfer, and this brought me to tears ... yes, I'm a nerd.

Bullet Points: Another Marvel project. A simple "What if?" If the assassin who killed Captain America's creator completed his task 24 hours earlier, and, at the same time, killing one of the bodyguards, a Ben Parker, what would the world look like. The only thing that I've read that compares to it in comics is the ASM 9-11 issue ... also by JMS.

Midnight Nation-- Okay, this was pure, unadulterated awesome. An LA cop finds himself caught in the crossfire between Heaven and Hell, and loses his soul, becoming one of the lost people of the Midnight Nation.

In order to get his soul back, he has to cross all of America to New York City to face the Devil himself.

Squadron Supreme and Rising Stars -- the only works I can honestly not endorse. Even JMS has complaints about Squadron Supreme.

Update: Sorry, I'm from New York, the Midwest, unfortunately, does look alike to me -- New Mexico or Oklahoma. Especially since the artwork in the JMS Thor comic and the images in the Thor movie looked the same to me. I suspect Kenneth Branaugh looked at the comic and said "This doesn't match Oklahoma, where does it match? Nex Mexico? We're there."

Chicago politics, White house

I do so enjoy it when government tells me that they're doing something "for the children."

When has that ever been the case? Seriously?  Every time they do something "for" anyone, it's mostly just about themselves.

Let's take the nanny-state laws passed under the motivation and campaigning of Michelle Obama.  You know, how every school lunch from now until the end of time will only serve healthy food?


Tell it to the schoolkids in Los Angeles, who have  blown the whistle on the East Wing chef-in-chief’s healthy-lunch dictates. The school district dropped chicken nuggets, corn dogs, and flavored milk from the menu for “beef jambalaya, vegetable curry, pad Thai, lentil and brown rice cutlets, and quinoa and black-eyed pea salads.” Cool, right?  


According to a weekend report by the Los Angeles Times, the city’s “trailblazing introduction of healthful school lunches has been a flop.” While the Obama administration has showered the nation’s second-largest school district with nutrition awards, thousands of students rebelled and started their own forbidden-food black market — with teachers joining in. 


Moreover, “principals report massive waste, with unopened milk cartons and uneaten entrees being thrown away.”

This is despite a massive increase in spending on nutritional improvements — from $2 million to $20 million alone over the last five years on fresh produce.

This despite a nearly half-billion-dollar budget shortfall and 3,000 layoffs earlier this year.

Earlier this spring, L.A. school officials acknowledged that the sprawling district is left with a whopping 21,000 uneaten meals a day, in part because the federal school-lunch program “sometimes requires more food to be served than a child wants to eat.” The leftovers will now be donated to nonprofit agencies. But after the recipients hear about students’ reports of moldy noodles, undercooked meat, and hard rice, one wonders how much of the “free” food will go down the hatch — or down the drain. Ahhh, savor the flavor of one-size-fits-all mandates.

There’s nothing wrong with encouraging our children to eat healthier, of course. There’s nothing wrong with well-run, locally based, and parent-driven efforts. But the federal foodie cops care much less about students’ waistlines than they do about boosting government and public-union payrolls.

In a little-noticed announcement several months ago, Obama health officials declared their intention to use school-lunch applications to boost government health-care rolls. Never mind the privacy concerns of parents.  Chicago public-school officials banned students from bringing home-packed meals made by their own parents. 

In April, the Chicago Tribune reported that “unless they have a medical excuse, they must eat the food served in the cafeteria.” The bottom line? Banning homemade lunches means a fatter payday for the school and its food provider.

And the biggest beneficiaries of Michelle Obama's efforts over the past three years have been her husband’s deep-pocketed pals at the Service Employees International Union. There are 400,000 workers who prepare and serve lunch to American schoolchildren. SEIU represents tens of thousands of those workers and is trying to unionize many more at all costs.

In L.A., the district’s cafeteria fund is $20 million in the hole thanks to political finagling by SEIU Local 99. The union’s left-wing allies on the school board and in the mayor’s office pressured the district to adopt reckless fiscal policies awarding gold-plated health benefits to part-time cafeteria workers in the name of “social justice.” As one school-board member who opposed the budget-busting entitlements said: “Everyone in this country deserves health benefits. But it was a very expensive proposal. And it wasn’t done at the bargaining table, which is where health benefits are usually negotiated. And no one had any idea where the money was going to come from.”

Early next year, Mrs. Obama will use the “success” of her child-nutrition campaign to hawk a new tome and lobby for more money and power in concert with her husband’s reelection campaign.

Time to order out.

Christmas blog: Cool stuff. Cooking for 93.

The odds that anyone is going to read the blog today are so slender, it's improbably ridiculous.

However, for those of you who have tripped over my website today, you will not go away empty handed.

First up: have you ever had to cook for relatives?  On Thanksgiving?  Without any help from the vast army you're feeding?

If the answer is yes: enjoy.




Next up, you've seen my videos -- and if you haven't, look in the right hand margin, and you'll find them soon enough.

However, now that I've seen this awesome group, I think I should hire them before I try doing another one.

What the hell, seriously?

What's wrong with you women?  And I mean that with the deepest, most sincere respect, but what the hell.

I recently started dating again.  Not so much jumping back into the dating pool, but trying to swim at the deep end of the pool.  Someone sends me an email on Okcupid.com, a dating website, and I reply.  She thinks I'm cool, and awesome, and I don't know who she thinks she's talking about, but apparently, tag, I'm it.

Great, I have a date. And the woman works not five minutes from my house. By walking.

Even more important, when I tell her that I don't want an over-sexed relationship, she agrees. This can't get any better.  Really.

We talk, we meet.  She's pleasant, and friendly, with a light southern accent, well spoken, 5'9", and somewhere northwards of 190 ... but I really don't care, I'm not much to look at either.

So we sit down at the local pizza place...  and she's playing footsie with me ten minutes into the date.  How do I know? Because after twenty minutes, she's either fondling my shoe with her foot, or she really isn't noticing.

And, I asked her.  She said yes....Yeah, I asked a woman if she was flirting with me .... shut up. I know nothing of nonverbal cues.  I need a great big neon sign and fireworks.

By the end of the dinner portion of our evening, I start walking her towards my car, offering her a ride home.  She's wrapped arm and arm with me ... I go with it, it seems harmless.  When I ask why she wanted to avoid the garlic rolls, she said "You're a smart guy, you'll figure it out."

Blink .... Wait, does that mean she expects me to kiss her?  Well, okay, not a problem. I'm okay with that.  And I try it, and she needs me to help her walk for a little.

Finally I drop her off at home, she invites me in.  She kisses me.  There's some of that, and we go back to talking.  Though, after a while, given her reactions to kissing, I figure I should ask something -- how she saw the evening playing out.

By end of the evening, she's humping my leg....  Fail.

Let's fast forward to this week  (yes, leg humping was only two weeks ago. Tis the season, apparently).

This week, I compliment a female writer friend of mine about her book.  I give her nothing but compliments.

I tell her that I can hear Alyson Hannigan playing out one scene in her book.  My exact words: "all I can hear is a vampiric Alyson Hannigan saying “Bored now, bye.” "-- citing a particular episode from Buffy the Vampire Slayer where the actress was a vampire in an alternate dimension.

I tell her that I liked her use of time; it was very 24-ish (yes, I like 24; Jack Bauer rules, and let's torture the shit out of terrorists. Anyone got a problem with that?).

And I reacted to one of her scenes with an "Oy" and a great big smiley.

Her reply?

I realize you're used to making uncensored comments on manuscripts, but it really doesn't help when the first public comment on something I've written is "Bored now, bye"! 

If it's boring, you can do what everyone else does and just stop reading it. I will not be offended. This chapter was very girl-talky anyway, and you're not a girl-talk kind of reader.

WHAT? I compare the book to a thriller, and you ask about girl talk. I compare your character to something out of Joss Whedon, you read that as "boring"?  


WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE!!!!!!!!!!

Writing a love story.

I've mentioned how many different things that my novel, A Pius Man, happens to be. I've mentioned how I blow up public places. That there is philosophy, shootouts, history, explosions, theology, a car chase, RPGs (not role playing games), property damage, and … hmm, there's something else there.

Oh, yeah, a love story.

It's not that strange. After all, a love story seems almost obligatory nowadays. Usually, as a motivation for senseless violence after killing off half of the couple involved. Even if it's as simple as a boy and his dog … or a boy and his robotic killing machine in Terminator 2.

I mean, hell, what makes me qualified to do a romance subplot? I mean, hell, I'm weird, maybe you've noticed. Just from the various and sundry topics on the site, I'm all over the place. I've done comic books, politics, terrorism, writing, music, book reviews, and the list keeps going. The less said about theology, the better.

But a love story?

Here's the thing. I'm in love …

Yes, with a woman … Yes, she's human …

And non-fiction …

No, she's not “from Canada”...

Though she might as well be.

It's complicated.


I met this woman online, and she didn't come onto me in any way. She saw I was a fan of J. Michael Straczynski, when she asked to be friends on Myspace. This was back when Myspace was actually good for something ...

Yes, that long ago.

We exchanged emails. We found out that we have a lot in common. We make fun of the same people. We like the same authors. We have the same sense of humor....

On the same sense of humor: we each started talking about one book that had come out – a Jim Butcher novel called Turncoat. My family had gotten the book before her local library had, and she said, “No spoilers.”

At which point, my default setting was to tease her. “So I shouldn't tell you about the love interest being the traitor, and Y-person 'comforting' our hero afterwards …? …. Which of course is impossible for me to know, because I haven't I haven't been able to read the book at all, so I know nothing.”

Her response was “Ye gods, your second paragraph had me wanting to claw my eyes out before I got to your third! Mission accomplished; you got me good.”

I think I fell a little bit in love with her that day.

Though what prompted me to first say it was when she sent me a little bit of “flair” that said “Good morning, I see the assassins have failed.”

And I had sent her the exact same flair about the exact same time.

My reply was mostly in jest: “I am certain that we are compatibly dorky and violent. I must hit on you.... “

Her response: “Hit on me? This could get scary if we're ever on the same side of the continent at the same time. But don't let that stop you. :)”

But that was as far at it went. The rest of that exchange had to deal with the spoilers discussion from above. Every once in a while, we would mention “flirtation subtitles,” or hand signals (via email). We would compare dating histories, then discuss Alan Moore's League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Victor Hugo, and try to write Jim Butcher's next few books for him. We had similar jokes on sex scenes in novels – and even considered doing a similar twist on the cliché for a later novel: an idea we had developed independent of each other.

We challenge each other – I know she challenges me, and she claims the same, but she covers it so very well and so effortlessly, I wouldn't know unless she told me.

We then started shipping books back and forth for conferences she didn't get to, but I did, and vice versa. She got me into a webcomic she was following in hardcopy … then I read ahead of her by reading it online.

After two years of back and forth, we met in person at an aquarium. Nothing overdramatic, but it was pleasant. We talked of comic book characters, and sharks and Peter Benchley. When we tried footnoting the real life story Benchley stole Jaws from, we both knew it was 1916, in the New York area, but we disagreed on the shark type and the exact location. Then we found a plaque dedicated to Jaws, and discovered that I was right about the shark, she was right about the location.

Together, we can remember a whole story.

I suspect that with her, I can even pass for a whole and complete person.

Since we are on opposite ends of the universe, she has encouraged me to try dating -- if only as a trial run. She is the only woman for whom I would drag myself into the quagmire of the dating pool.

No, she is not the most beautiful woman in the universe – well, she is, but I can't say that, because she somewhat disagrees with me on the topic, and it's easier just to smile, nod, and talk about something else.

I think she's beautiful and wondrous. And she is truly the brightest star in my star ...

Thankfully, I have a 50/50 chance of her reading this blog … so, shhh, don't tell her.

But not only is she beautiful, she's smart, and kind, and generous. She offers time she doesn't have, but by God, she will make it. I suspect if/when A Pius Man sells it will be because of her time and effort in edits.

No, it's not easy. I've hit her self-destruct buttons a few times without knowing it. In fact, once, I jabbed it repeatedly in the same few hours without realizing it. And I nearly triggered a nervous breakdown. By email alone.

We're working on our communication.

As I said, not easy. But if love were easy, I wouldn't trust it. I've had love come to me easily. Twice. Both times, it ended in the most spectacularly awful implosion.

So, it's not easy. But it's right.

That is pretty much what I hope to do in my novels...

Notice how my relationship developed. Little details. Small things that add up into a very nice big picture. Our tiny jabs at Stephen King, the light teasing about Terry Prachett. Change the details if you like, but that's mostly how I like to think most romance stories should go.

Then again, if I wrote a romance novel, I suspect that my two leads would only get to an “I love you” by the end of the book. Possibly on the last page. Or when they're about to be killed.

And it's not easy. But it's right.

The Videos of A Pius Man

A lot of what I've been doing lately has been in support of my novel A Pius Man..  This includes movies ... yeah, I'm doing my own trailers. Without CGI.

This is where I've collected the ones done thus far.

This wasn't the first one, but it was a remodeled version of it. I cleaned up the typeface a little, and I think the visuals are spliced together better.

The images are obviously not done by me. Anyone who's found the Vatican Ninja images I've done will notice that.  They're from a lot of books that take one side of the Pope Pius XII argument, such as it is. And, just maybe, a Dan Brown novel.

I'm subtle like that.

And then, then there were the character trailers.

[More below the break]

Music blog: Heart of a Dragon, One Winged Angel, and Halo

Sorry, this Tuesday, I can't honestly say that there's anything I want to blog about.....



So, music blog.



You remember back when I mentioned I was a nerd? This is proof. I present you with the most epic soundtrack I've heard in years .... the main theme for the Halo video game series.



While I originally wanted to post this video, the owner disabled embedding. Darn it.

I have mentioned Dragonforce once or twice. Like I said before, I like their music for fight scenes. I'm not sure I understand what their songs are about.






And then there's this. Another video game soundtrack. This is the main villain's theme from Final Fantasy 7. I've never played the game, but I can't argue with a theme that can utilize an entire orchestra.



Music to Write To: Winterborn, Cambreadth, and Over the Hills....

Sometimes your friends know best.



After months of doing non-fiction, "high-intellect" blog posts, some of my friends could see what it was doing to me better than I could. Let's just say that they could tell I was under a strain. Also, they found the posts boring.


So, time for something fun.

It's been a while since I posted on this blog, and I really think I should get back into the swing of posting whatever I like. Which include history, blowing stuff up on paper, and doing it to really cool music.

Here's some more stuff that I enjoy writing to.


"Winterborn," by the Cruxshadows. I never know what to do with this band. They are nominally "Goth,"  but they tend to use a lot of classical imagery. I first encountered from in a John Ringo novel called Ghost.(A book I will talk about at a later date, with a few cautionary notes ... it's not that bad, but there is one section that should carry a warning label)  I had no idea what the song was about, so I looked it up on YouTube. The title is taken from something that could be from the original Illiad -- that the bravest of those who died were born in winter.

In this case, the visuals are taken from the video game "Halo 2."




"March of Cambreadth," by Heath Alexander. I first discovered this song in a John Ringo novel called When the Devil Dances, a scifi military novel about a cannibalistic Mongol horde spreading through the galaxy, with only humans to stand in the way. While the author himself refers to it as carnography (which I can only presume means "carnage porn"), it's well designed, the characters fully developed, and there's enough scheming and political intrigue to fully screw up a war.... the images are from the tv show Babylong 5, which happens to also be a scifi war epic. I know this because I assembled the video myself.






"Over the Hills and Far Away."  It's an army song from the Napoleonic wars, and was first introduced to most people through the British tv movie series "Sharpe's Rifles." Richard Sharpe, the main character, was played by Sean Bean.... coincidentally the one who played Boromir in the video below.





"Over the Hills and Far Away," by Nightwish.  I found this one song while looking for the it's partner above. And, wow, was I in for a surprise.







And, a final one for today.  Remember all of those movie trailers, when you listen to the awesome soundtrack, and you expect to hear it in the movie... only to discover that it's not there, only in the trailer?

Odds are, it's Two Steps from Hell.

Music Blog: 307 Ale, Halo, Dragon Rider

By the way, before we begin, please remember that we have a contest ongoing.  Also, if you could check out some of our sponsors on the way out, it would be nice.  Thanks.

Anyway, today is the return of Filk music.

Tom Smith: 307 Ale .... the world's first hyper beer.



More below the break.

FAQ: Where do you get your ideas?

I've been doing a bit of writing, and I've touched on this briefly during the series on how I created A Pius Man, but, apparently, the question many authors are besieged with is “How do you come up with your ideas?”

Short answer: formal viewpoint. Or a functional mentality.

For example, last year, I saw Forbes Magazine with cover article about how al-Qaeda was losing money, and it suggested that Osama "needed a new business model."

I can not make this stuff up.

The point is, people look at things from a “formal viewpoint.” I would look at a large pile of money and think of where a character would hide it. An accountant would probably count it all. A pyromaniac would look at it as stuff to burn.

[More below the break]

Music blog: Tom Smith's Rocket Ride, Where Dragons Rule, Halo

This is Tom Smith's classic "Rocket Ride."  Basically, making fun of every major high-budget scifi movie made .... possibly in the last twenty years.  Give or take a decade.


I think it's kinda fun.

Enjoy

Dragonforce: Where Dragons Rule, as done to Halo.

Month in review: November, 2011

Well, another month shot to hell.  :)

Anyway, November was an interesting little month. This was the month I discovered Stumbleupon.com.... and I posted links to almost every single blog entry, and tossed in some of Masks as well .... only in that case, I crashed the website for a little bit. Oops.

So, all of that adds up to this month having over 13,255 hits on the blog.  It's been a good month.  Even if I had to rewrite the top ten blog list. I may still yet have to.

Anyway...

I've written characters of mine who take surveys, starting with Egyptian cop Hashim Abasi ... who has a list of enemies on his mouse pad.

And, if you ever missed a video we've done thus far, well, you can't: here are the complete Videos of A Pius Man.  Not to mention that there's also a video going around the net that makes me think I have to seriously up my A-game: a live action recreation of a video game fight from the epic game Arkham city.

Oh yes, and there is a contest going on: I hope someone has noticed.

Our music blogs have had: Dragonforce's Heart of a Dragon, Final Fantasy's One Winged Angel, and Mozart. We also had Tom Smith's Cooking for 93 ... a little something for Thanksgiving.  There was also the classic science fiction summary in song Rocket Ride, by Tom Smith, as well as some Dragonforce's Where Dragons Rule.  We also had some Two steps from Hell, and the greatest beer that any bar has ever had for sale: it's Three-oh-seven Ale.

I've also had the most FAQ that any author has ever had to deal with: "Where do you get your ideas from?"  Here's an answer.

There was also some issues with Google.  Feh.

And, finally, there was a self defense review: with kill shots, Occupiers, and ... something else, I'm sure.

See you Monday.

The Politics of ... Captain America?

I don't think words can really convey how much I hate politics.  Even though I've done at least two blogs on the topic, around the Ground Zero Mosque, and the politics of my novel, and I would like politicians to just shut up already.

But now, someone had to go putting their politics into my comic book movies.

Before I continue, this is nothing new. Every time a superhero movie comes out, it must be metaphor for modern politics. The Dark Knight was seen by some idiots at the NYTimes as a commentary on the War on Terror.  Which is odd, I thought it was merely "the Joker is evil, and if we're going to catch the bugger, we're going to have to break a few laws to do it."

The Times were also instrumental in discussing the Lord of the Rings as metaphor as well, with the theatrical release of Return of the King's absence of Saruman being likened unto a missing Osama.  Instead, everyone who saw the Return of the King, special edition knows that Saruman was deleted from the film because of time issues.

Spoiler alert:

Saruman the White is dead.

So is Grima Wormtongue.

So is Osama bin Laden.

The end.

Now, somebody at Salon  has decided to make Captain America into something ... else.

After the July 22 release of the summer blockbuster "Captain America: the First Avenger," we'll probably see even more Captain Americas waving placards at protests for all parts of the political spectrum. The Red, White and Blue Avenger is and always has been a potent political image, but whose side would Captain America be on? Would he be a New Deal Democrat slinging his mighty shield for new public works programs or would he be rallying with the Tea Party to lower taxes on billionaires and gut Medicare? Whose Captain America is he anyway?

I can't make this up.

Captain America with an economic policy? Really? Doesn't he have enough problems with facing the forces of darkness every other day?  "Captain America, what's your stance on -- oops, this just in, Hydra's trying to take over the world again ... and Captain America just ran away from our reporters' questions!  How dare he!!!"

Anyway, the quote above is taken, as noted, from Salon.com. Someone sent me a National Review Online newsletter, with an interesting, non-political stance.

 Must he have a position on entitlement reform? Can't he spend most of his waking hours fighting the Red Skull, Crossbones, Hydra, and Avengers' management issues? (Picture him working out the schedule: "Can't leave Iron Man and Thor working the Friday night shift together; they'll take a Quinjet on a beer run and before the night is over, some building will get leveled, some villain will be pummeled and filing an excessive force suit, and some innocent bystander will touch some mystic artifact or advanced nanotechnology and 'have an origin.'" )

I may just be easily amused, but I find it funny that the National Review writers are nerds.

I'm a little embarrassed that someone has to write this down. And the sad thing is, the Salon writer seemed to be in deadly earnest. Argh.

But, seriously, someone has got to go on their meds.  Now.