In honor of Valentine’s Day, check out this bizarre sight we found at (of all places) Borders a while back:
Yes, it’s Star Trek perfume inspired by the Vulcan mating urge.
But, wait, there’s more!
Apparently, they want you to believe that Starfleet Medical has isolated the factor that made Captain James T. Kirk a 23rd century Casanova (in SPAAACE!) and have bottled it to sell.
The final season of Lost is off to a good start. They found a way to follow through on the cosmic reset button that didn’t bug the heck out of me, explained some things, and set up an intriguing direction for the final arc. It will be really interesting to see how the two narratives relate.
The only downside is that it looks like ABC has decided to throw Better Off Ted under the bus. I was really hoping that it was only preempted for the two-hour premiere, but there’s no sign of it next week. It would be nice if they’d at least let the show finish out the season.
Also: really angry at ABC News’s scare tactics of “OMG Al Qaeda intends to attack us!” Um, yeah. We knew that. We’ve known that for over a decade. We’ve known that since before 9/11. Trying to scare your viewers into a panic at every commercial break is not what I’d call responsible journalism.
Anyway, Lost spoilers below…
Myth Adventures, Phil Foglio’s comic-book adaptation of Robert Asprin’s fantasy/comedy novel, Another Fine Myth, is being serialized as a free webcomic [Edit: no longer available.], in the same format as Girl Genius. I remember spending a lot of effort tracking down the mid-1980s books on eBay, before they finally reissued the collection.
The title of that first novel was originally going to be Another Fine Mess, from the Laurel and Hardy catch-phrase, but someone misheard it and Robert Asprin decided he liked that version better. It turns out that “Another fine mess” is actually a misquote itself, according to this the New York Times article on why we misquote movies (via @johannadc). It was originally “Here’s another nice mess you’ve gotten me into.”
In the 1940s, comic book publishers would often re-purpose an old series to avoid postal fees for launching a new one. For example, the super-hero book All-Star Comics became All Star Western.
EC’s Moon Girl was infamous. It launched as a superhero title, became Moon Girl Fights Crime! by issue #7, and A Moon…A Girl…Romance with issue #9 as they tried to figure out just what genre audiences wanted.
Eventually it became Weird Fantasy, then Weird Science-Fantasy, then finished its run as Incredible Science-Fiction. It ended with the story, “Judgment Day,” an allegory against racism which the Comics Code Authority tried to censor.
I just read that someone’s reviving it. The original super-hero character has fallen into the public domain, and the new series, described as “‘The Dark Knight’ meets ‘Mad Men,” is being published through comiXology’s iPhone comics…60 years later.
I keep misreading the Snapea Crisps as Snape Crisps…and then Katie noticed that you could pick out a related name from the Maragogype Coffee at Trader Joe’s.
Somehow I don’t think he’s taking this quite as seriously as Faire folk might prefer…
At the Renaissance Pleasure Faire held at Glen Helen Park near San Bernardino, California in spring 2001. (Yeah, I’ve been scanning old photos again…)
Update: I like this filmstrip-style filter and border. It’s a good fit for a Throwback Thursday on Instagram.
