Play Is Pay

Not a real post today, sorry. I'm still humming from last night's Springsteen concert and then there was the little matter of a final project that isn't *quite* finished yet and needs to be presented online at 5pm.

Today's shirt was a Teefury (maybe Redbubble?) gift from Mitch and J and marries the raison d'être of Firefly's Mal and Jayne with the joie de vivre of Calvin and Hobbes. Fittingly, graphic artist Karen Hallion titled her work "Malvin and Cobbes". It's a whole series. Bonus points for clever...

**Addendum (28Nov2012)**

With grateful thanks for Steven Rubio, here are videos of my three favourite moments from the Springsteen concert:

Now THAT is a rock star, people! 63 years young and trusting his fans enough to crowd surf. Have to admit that I was afraid at times that Vancouver would be the city that dropped The Boss on his head but he made it back to the stage okay.

I hope that the little girl he brought on stage to sing with him will NEVER EVER forget that moment.

From young to the young at heart, I'll wager that every woman in Rogers Arena fell in love Monday night.

The one other stand-out memory for me Monday night was the moment of tribute for Clarence "The Big Man" Clemons during "Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out". Of course, the video from the show would be five to ten minutes of pure applause... which is impressive but you really need to be there.

Hope you all are humming now too. Jeff had no idea what he was in for when he agreed to come with me but he was seriously impressed.

Oh, and my presentation when well even though I forgot to turn on the webcam. *shrug* the mic worked and no one seemed to mind that they couldn't see me as they were all operating their own link to my slideshow. Briefly, I'm taking a course on "Highly Able Learners" (once labelled "gifted" but the term has fallen out of favour) and the assignment was to create a document that explains the learning needs of these types of students and present an ideal environment in which to support them. As the document needs to be thorough without me there to interpret, some of the slides are a little wordy. Being a course run by a fairly optimistic instructor with a sense of humour, I went a little over-the-top with my ideal school. Being me, I've included the Simpsons and The Big Bang Theory in my Prezi (which, btw, is a really fun way to make a presentation). Take a look if you're inclined.

Brochure on Prezi

Building Vocab, Creating 'Verses

I think the first phrase I ever adopted from watching a show or reading a book was "Geez Louise". I was about nine and can't remember now where I picked it up from. I do remember being reprimanded by a schoolmate at our Catholic private school for taking the Lord's name in vain. I was shocked. I was? Nine-year-old me had never made the connection between "Geez" and "Jesus".

Joss Whedon's use of "shiny" as a blanket positive term in his Firefly/Serenity universe has been adopted globally by Browncoats everywhere as has the slang abbreviation " 'verse " to denote both real and fictional uni- and multi- verses.

Today's shirt is a Teefury buy and I'm almost absolutely sure that Mitch and J also ordered their own when they bought this gift for me. Jayne, after all, is Mitch's favourite character from Firefly/Serenity.

Like Shakespeare, the truly creative minds of contemporary times use language itself as a power device that sets their world-building apart from other endeavours. BSG's "frak". Star Wars' "nerf herder". Star Trek's "make it so". And Big Bang Theory's "Bazinga". Scott Westerfeld's Uglies series is another example, this time in the literary forum, where the slang is an intrinsic part of the characters and society in his post-apocalyptic California. In fact, it was such a major part, he co-wrote an entire companion book to the series, glossing the slang. 

In high school, my social circle headed out to see Mad Love, starring Chris O'Donnell and Drew Barrymore. Not actually sure why we picked it in the first place. We didn't love the movie after seeing it but the title tickled us as a pun-ny sort of euphemism for movies in general. For at least a few months afterwards, we referred to movie night as Mad Love Night. We thought it was fun-ny.

Language is a huge part of our world and what we adopt from our media reflects our interests and appreciation for the effort that goes into that which entertains us. Have any other words/phrases learned from shows or books worked their way into your vernacular?

The Joy of Grumpy Old Men

To be clear, one does not need to be chronologically aged nor necessarily male to qualify for the category of "Grumpy Old Man". And "grumpy" does not equate "nasty", "creepy", or "mean". It denotes a state of "grump", wherein a mostly positive world view is balanced with a realistic dash of snark. It is a category that I regard with great affection. Many of my most beloved friends and family - including the individual I plan to marry next year - fall into this category. In fact, the hint of "Grumpy Old Man"-ness (aka GOM-ness) in a person tends to alert me that we will probably get along just fine.

Today's t-shirt is from the wonderful world of Teefury where awesome new geek-tastic tees can be seen and bought everyday... but ONLY for a day. As their motto says,"Tee Today, Gone Tomorrow"

This t-shirt was entitled "Frakking Awful" and comes from the artistic mind of Matt Dearden whose other past t-shirts have drawn inspiration from Chuck, Mad Men, House, Dexter, and Tron.  As nice as these other shirts are/were, "Frakking Awful" was an immediate must-buy for me as it drew from both The Muppet Show and the Ronald D Moore Battlestar Galactica. 

A quick confession: When the reimagined Battlestar was announced, I was incredibly excited about the news. I was a huge fan of the campy, Star-Wars-rip-off 70s series. I wanted a robotic daggitt like Boxey had. I wanted to fly Vipers. I wanted to be as pretty as Serina (later that was amended to Dr. Quinn and, as of last night, the outrageously amazing Colleen Bash). And, most of all, nine-year-old me wanted to marry Starbuck (Dirk Benedict) - which I told him when I met him in person two years ago. So, all ramped up with child-like adoration, I watched the pilot mini-series. I had already learned that Starbuck had been re-scripted as a woman, Kara Thrace, played by Katee Sackhoff, which set me a little back on my heels but when Boomer, who was also re-scripted as a woman and no longer the big burly black man from the original series, was revealed to be a sleeper Cylon, I turned off the TV as the credits ran and felt incredibly betrayed. So when the show was picked up as a series, I carefully avoided it despite the praise it garnered from trusted sources. It was probably over a year after the series wrapped before I could bring myself to watch it and, once I'd locked away the outraged nine-year-old me in my head, I had to admit it was a great series. 

Although it was a great thrill when Edward James Olmos (portrayed in today's t-shirt as Statler/Adama - errr, on the right) followed me on Twitter (he follows back everyone), I have never met the man in person. Love his support of Water Keepers and deeply admire his body of work in Hollywood but, alas, never scored a face-to-face with the man who saved humanity. Michael Hogan (Waldorf/Saul Tigh) was back in Vancouver a couple of summers ago (filming Red Riding Hood, I believe) and I did get to meet him briefly and though I did get a distinct GOM vibe off him, our interaction wasn't long enough to really blog about.

So, to take a tangential path: During Comic-Con San Diego 2010, I happened to meet the BSG Chief himself, Aaron Douglas, and began our conversation by admitting to him that I hadn't been able to watch his show while it aired although, I assured him, the situation had been remedied since. In typical Douglas, he was witty and understanding and to-the-point in his response. "That's okay," he said,"I didn't watch your show either." 

**** Ah-ha, GOM detected! ****

Apologies to Wil Wheaton for cropping him out in this one

Now, the key to the lovability of GOMs is that they are capable of quiet, intense acts of thoughtfulness. One that I worked with at my last school was my own personal Santa Claus. Classroom too hot? He arrives with an industrial-sized laboratory fan. Need more caffeine in the mornings? Coffee-maker appears on my desk the next morning. Mysterious doughnut delivered to a dark, locked and unoccupied room? It was not, as I initially thought, an ACME roadrunner trap. It was my bristly, caustic GOM neighbour. Mr. Douglas is much the same way but with the twist of celebrity. A month before Christmas 2009, he started a campaign through his LiveJournal and Twitter-feed to provide a local hospital with portable DVD players and a library of DVDs for patients and family members visiting long-term care patients. It was a wonderful idea and the Lion's Gate Hospital benefited from this campaign as a legacy in the name of Richard McArthur, the father of one of the BSG producers. When I followed up on how the campaign went with Aaron in person in 2010, he happily recounted the outpouring of support from fans, as well as the cast and crew of BSG. In detail, he described how, at McArthur's funeral, each member of the cast brought a brand-new, boxed portable DVD player for the cause and presented it to the producer. By the end, she was completely hidden by the pile she was carrying. Aaron has also supported the promotion of his brother's book sales through his social media platforms and EmCee'd a fundraiser for Vancouver-based band The Town Pants last year when their van and equipment was stolen (Van - sans equipment - was recovered later with the help of a roller derby girl. Seriously). Mr. Douglas is a first-class, softy-in-the-centre, Grumpy Old Man. Not bad for a frakkin' toaster.

So, the next time, you're yelled at to get off a lawn or you're lectured on how things were better when they were young, remember that you're probably in the presence of one of these secretly awesome individuals. Of course, if you're reading this, you may very well be the GOM in the situation. And that makes me happy.