I just discovered this Star Trek: The Next Generation gag reel from season 2 (I think). As if I needed another reason to love Star Trek. I’ve watched it twice tonight. SO GOOD.
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Category Archives: nerd
Fun with words
I cannot recommend the H. P. Lovecraft reading experience highly enough. In addition to being totally immersed in his fantastic writing style and dark, misty universe full of monsters and ancient, unspeakable evil, Lovecraft is making me a smarter person. New vocabulary for the win!
smooth with bubbles inside
Word of the Week: Fulgurite
Fulgurites are awesome. They’re the result of a lightning strike (or some other intense discharge of energy, like a downed power line) to the ground. The soil/sand fuses and liquefies, then instantly hardens, creating a tube in the shape of the path the discharging energy took.
Here’s the really cool part: Fulgurites can be found all over the Sahara desert. Why would that be? There’s no lightning in the Sahara desert today, but the presence of fulgurites demonstrates that what is now a desert used to have completely different eco and weather systems. So tubes of glassy sand buried deep in the desert tell us that the driest desert on the planet used to have intense rain and thunder storms. Super cool!
the path of lightning
Bilbo, my old friend
I first read The Hobbit at age 12. I remember having it in my lap in my sixth grade classroom, sneaking peeks here and there while Mr. Miller wasn’t looking. I couldn’t get through it fast enough.
There’s a lot of tension for whatever reason about the movie about to come out, as if it might suck (unlikely). But if it isn’t amazing (unlikely), everyone (nerds) will be disappointed. Spoiler alert: The movie is never as good as the book. So I’m over it before it starts. I’m in love with the book. If there are pretty pictures to go with it, so be it. I’ll consider it an addendum to my already awesome childhood memories of this book.
nothing can ruin this story for me, so stop trying, peter jackson.
My folks got me the Lord of the Rings trilogy the xmas of 1995, and I got maybe 50 pages in before I got bored. Who was this Frodo character? Where was Bilbo? He was my homie, if he wasn’t in this one, I didn’t give a shit. So I stopped reading.
I picked it back up a few years ago and zomg amazeballs. Highly recommended, even for those who don’t consider themselves nerds or whatever, GET OVER IT, it’s a fantastic bunch of literature, and you’re missing out by not reading it. Just download it onto your Kindle, and if anyone asks what you’re reading you can lie to save your ego and tell them it’s something all those normal people are reading, like 50 Shades of Obvious Porn, or Beautiful Creatures who Whine for 500 Pages.
A guide to online comics
I realized I’ve been referencing a lot of online comics to friends recently, and it’s super awkward. “In this one online comic I read, there’s a character who’s a troll with really terrible gas, and he’s hilarious, but anyway…” Not what I could call a quality, two-sided conversation.
Flow chart to the rescue! This is the last week of my first semester in my online Master’s degree program. I made this during class. In fact, class is still going on as I type this. I still have a 10-page paper to do for this class, so I don’t feel too bad about making time to do something fun.
i made this
“Yes! A thousand times, yes!”
The proper response: “Make it so.” Obviously. I hope Boyfriend does something like this if/when he proposes. And he will, assuming he knows me at all.
only a filthy Ferengi says no to Picard
Little heroines
Kids dressing like superheroes is adorable and fantastic. No wonder there’s a website dedicated to them.
I don’t think I dressed up like a superhero, but I ran countless scenarios in my head about how I could save the day, and the superpowers I would use to do so. I was amazing. There were lots of cheesy one-liners and awesome poses, after which I would disappear while the adoring public wondered where I was, and reporters wrote articles giving me cool nicknames.
Not sure why I’m writing in the past tense.
I love you, Japan
by Kono Bairei
The art of the Japanese woodblock print is a fantastic demonstration of how, with very limited means, humans make spectacularly beautiful art. Woodblock prints are some of the most delicate, intricate works produced from Japan. They’re just gorgeous. Hokusai’s Great Wave of Kanagawa is probably the most famous, and it’s not hard to see why. [Then there’s the erotic woodblock print genre, which is pretty hilarious, and occasionally horrifying, but I digress]
I found today a series of classic video game characters (Samus, Megaman, Link) illustrated in the style of traditional Japanese woodblock prints. They’re so silly and cool. Nerds are the best. Japan is the best. I love you, Japan.
I remember playing through the first few hours of Metroid Prime (which I need to replay, what a great game) before Diminutive Roommate told me that Samus was female. I’ve played so many male characters, I was super excited to play a lady. I became attached to the game, fond of it even. It’s an old friend who made me die a lot, and freaked me out with space pirates. Good times.
I made this
I’ve re-watched the first couple episodes of Avatar: Legend of Korra, and this part just kills me. Meelo has been cemented as my favorite character so far. What a stinker.
If you don’t know about this series, let me make your day a little better. It’s a sequel to Avatar: The Last Airbender, which is an amazing series (ignore the disaster of a movie). The fight scenes are great, the characters are easy to love, and the series, which starts out as childish, becomes dark and emotionally deep. You’ll love it.
kids can be so cruel
Too hot to handle
glyph I saw on a stela at La Milpa, Belize
I woke up yesterday feeling good. I got an email a couple weeks ago from a friend and professor at UCLA, asking if I could lead his class through the ancient Maya exhibit at LACMA. Of course I accepted, and it went great. I was nervous the day before, but I pulled the class in front of a stela, and my mouth just started moving and I was awesome. So much fun! Once again (just like when I landed Karate Job), it was a small dream come true: I got to teach a group of college students about the ancient Maya.
I got home to dote on Diminutive Roommate, who is recovering from some minor surgery. Her mom came into town for it, and she’s the best. DR is healing quickly, and being a real champ about it. I think it really helps that her mom is here to be doctorly and motherly. She’s pretty great. We played Epic Spell Wars: Duel at Mount Skullzfyre, and had a little caramel Bailey’s. I can’t imagine my mom rolling with that kind of plan. She’s so full of judgement. Plus, we’d have to get her out of the house first.
Anyway, Diminutive Roommate has been sick for a couple of weeks, and I’ve been keeping my distance whenever I could to make sure I didn’t catch anything (although the kids at the dojo have been pretty nose-picky lately). I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised. My throat started hurting around 8pm. Within an hour I was sore everywhere and exhausted. I woke up this morning with a fever of 100.1. Crap. I emailed both jobs and said I wouldn’t be coming in. I’d just be arriving at Karate Job right now if I’d been healthy today.
Sister shared a memory with my family a little while ago that once, when I was sick with a fever, she covered me with blankets just like my folks told her to when they left for work. When they came back, I had a fever of 105 or something, and they got mad at her for putting all those blankets on me. We were just kids, she didn’t know any better. Still, she was next to tears when told us about that. I don’t remember that at all. She obviously still feels responsible. Poor Sister.
Gargoyles
classy and deadly
Gargoyles is one of the cartoons that defined the kind of person I wanted to grow up to be. One of the main characters, Detective Maza, was a beautiful, straightforward cop who kicked all kinds of ass and didn’t take shit from anyone. She’s a gun-toting, badge-wearing, ass-kicking justice machine who had gargoyles for friends. Naturally, she was my idol. Plus I wanted to be a gargoyle. So epic. The series was full of strong female characters. Even the evil ones like Demona were admirable.
Gargoyles was such a great series. It was beautifully illustrated, flooded with mythology and voiced by half of the Star Trek TNG cast. There’s nothing to dislike about this series other than the fact that it only ran for three seasons, and Disney has given up on releasing it on DVD in full due to poor first season sales. Goddammit. I’m reduced to watching it online.
the understated love story was almost too subtle for me at the time
Be Random, Be Clear 
