D10 Fitness Challenge Update

D10 Fitness Challenge Kudos to Mr. Onni Hart for his heroic Memorial Day '09 run at eating 15 La Pasadita burritos in 24 hours. He made it to 9. God rest his soul

KPax: Vulcon Series: Warrior Bot: The Silken Bot: Prologue: Fellowship of the Bot

Oh, hello. I did not see you there. It seems the agents have taken a religous respite for their holiday feast of Toshiba. I was taking this chance to update the manuscripts that will save our world. Why don't you sit down with me and we will share a tale, and maybe a hug? Close your weary eyes and sigh, and I will tell you of lighter times. . . .

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Long has it been known that the good folkery of Azural lived not for the shine of gold, nor the silvery sparkle of silver, but rather they made their livelihood of the beautiful cloths which they always traded and sometimes wore. Suredly all know that such splendid cloth can only be spun by the most elegant of Giant SilkWorms. Oh, how Azural had the finest. It is said that The Giant SilkWorm of Azural once produced a single thread of silk no less than the length of 175 tall men, or 215 of standard height. Lo, what a thread it was! The shiftless cloth merchants of Aquas paid mountains of gold for the magnificent garments fashioned from the thread.

The Merchant Trading Palace, in Happier Days.

In the days just after KPax beat back the forces of Shirella, bringing victory the War of Power, unrest crept into Azural once more. The women and children wept once more, for the Giant SilkWorm of Azural had been stolen! The giant worm had always been closely guarded by the forces of Azural, but some wicked evil had conspired to steal her under the duress of the War. The merchants of Aquas and the cloth makers of Azural feared there business was over. The Azurali and all other of the known world longed for the stylish garbs they once adorned.

"Good King Keestos, we beg you to undo this injustice done to us. Bring back our magnificent worm, that she way threaden from her supple spindle once more." Cried the people of Azural.

To this the great King could only lament, "Good people, I know not what has become of her, and know not how to get her back. Perhaps we must abandon of our tastes and cast aside our stunning dress, for more modest, simple garb." This of course hurt the king more than his people, for Keestos had always paid much mind to his wardrobe of metallic purple and lavender. It appeared as if hope was lost?"

Inside the mountain Keep of Cleveland, DeMarr, clad in his light green silken tunic and and dark yellow-brown scarf (it is said although the leaves may fall and winter dry the earth, wherever DeMarr did go, so too the colours of autumn) pondered the fate of Azural:

"KPax, all is lost. Although we won the struggle verse evil, what joy is there in a world not shinning of beautiful colours?? To this the loyal mountain of DeMarr's creation bellowed, "ALL IS NEVER LOST. AS LONG AS ONE HEART MAY YEARN FOR PEACE, HOPE SPRINGS ANEW."

At this you may wonder how it is that a Warrior Bot may speak with such prophetic prose. To that, the answer is clear. DeMarr programmed KPax with an awesome talent for oration. At that time however he still struggled as a conservationist with mere mortals, a flaw that plagued him for time to come, but that story is for another day. Back to the Keep of Cleveland.

"How is it you can be so calm, Bot Warrior, when the people of Azural suffer so?"

The Mountain Keep of Cleveland, where DeMarr gave birth to hope.

"I WILL GO IN FORCE TO SEARCH AND DESTROY THE EVIL USURPER OF THE WORM, AND I WILL RETURN HER TO SPINDLE FOR YOU GOOD PEOPLE ONCE MORE. BUT I CANNOT DO IT ALONE."

DeMarr made haste to Castle Keestos to tell him of their plan. When he found the King, Keestos was sitting atop his golden throne, clad in a grossly outdated checkered frock, truly a miserable site.

"Keestos," (the King and biologist had always been on informal, friendly terms) "what is this that you wear? You must change at once, if the people see you they will know we have fallen on truly horrid times."

"Oh DeMarr, but we have. The great worm is gone and lost and so too are we."

"No good Keestos, not if we send KPax Vulcon Series: The Warrior Bot, he will find and return our worm. But he must go forth in a stealthy quest party, that this plan may work. Who else can we send?"

The king sat in thought for some time, until he looked up with a smile.

"We have KPax: Vulcon Series: The Warrior Bot who is ever strong and true; with him we must only send those we know to be of true and loyal heart. We will send forth a fellowship of five. KPax the Vulcon Series, Gleek, Hoger the Ogre, and Lord Baron's two sons, Ugg and Narb. Together the five should thwart the our evil foes."

DeMarr was unsure.

"With respect good king, Gleek is certainly an affable lad, but a warrior? And Hoger is certainly strong as any, but does he lack the wits? And the brothers Baron are certainly clever, but are they not delinquents?"

"You have spoken true, alone they have their talents and banes, but together they will be a group fit to task."

The Boy Prince Gleek Ugg and Narb, the Warrior Twins Hogre the Ogre, with Watermelon

At that DeMarr saw why all of the realm knew Keestos to be the wisest of Kings.

The next morn the fellowship congregated. From most accounts the meating of the soon to be fabled consort was quite awkward. Naturally Gleek attempted to lighten the mood with one of his infamous quips; and history was made.

"Greetings KPax:Vulcon Series. I never imagined I'd bot into you this day." mused Gleek.

"I DO NOT PROCESS YOUR TRANSMISSION YOUNG MASTER GLEEK." KPax retorted.

A flustered Gleek could only stammer, "It was but a jest."

"I LEARN THAT HUMAN COMMUNICATION IS NOT LIMITED TO DATA. ALSO MUST WE COMMUNE TO LET US KNOW OUR OWN SOULS AND PROCESSING UNITS. I LOOK FORWARD TO US HAVING MADE HUMOUR TO ME SOON OR IN TH FUTURE DURING THIS PERILOUS JOURNEY." and so the Bot too had shown his wit and rancor.

I saw this made history, because it did. KPax bonded together a group of the most different of characters to be heroes of their age and ages to come. All will now know of the many daring feats they accomplished and the passing in battle of not too few of their own. In time you will know many of their quests but we will start with this one the first.

From the squar where they shared laughs they went forward. . .

KPax: Vulcon Series: The Warrior Bot: Fiat Botica

Long ago, in the many distant days before our age
There existed a great kingdom of gold and peace.
Happy did the men of this land live,
at peace with the animals and women around them.
As sure as the dragon swims through the river of time, so too did these able men learn their craft and live by the Code of the Elders.

Little did they know that in the East, there dwelled a gathering threat that would soon sweep through their little play world as an evil wind through a delicious orchard.
Little did they know that time immemorial had given rise to the Band of the Red Claw of Gorgoroth.


Born of the sinister machinations of the seductive Empress Shirella, the Red Claw were a greedy lot who wanted not but to bask in the rich resources and cloths of the realm. Like the stealthy stalk of the lion among prey, so too did the Red Claw of Gorgoroth make their war upon the good people of Azural.



The forces of King Keetsos were sorry to flee in the face of this reckless evil, as the Red Claw ravaged the people of Azural, slaying their children, defiling their women, and confiscating their many fine cloths for trade with the shiftless merchants of Aquas.

The Grand Council of Keetsos called before it the many sages of the realm, to find what might be done against the sorrowful flains of the inisidious Sirella. One of these sages was the famed biologist DeMarr, Lord Inspirator of the Second Age. Many times had DeMarr's pith and wit come to the aid of the King of Azural, but now his exhortations were falling on deaf ears, like water breaking on the lid of a shut jar.

"I tell you now, King Keetsos, as I have given my body and fluid for your city, trust in me to unleash the craft of the Vulcon Series upon the floding minions of the claw!"

At the mention of the sacred gift of the Vulcon, King Keetsos lifted his arm, and clutchingly stopped the hand of the maiden running the Royal comb through his long and legendary beard. With an air of royalty that only true Kings and those like kings might have, he said, "DeMarr, together we have fought many battles, and stretched in many ways, but you know as well as I that the Vulcon cannot be unleashed using the powers of Azural. We have no soul pure enough to entrust with such power. Should we make a man of Azural one with the Vulcon, we would hazard living at the knees of a Bot God. We cannot give the power of the Warrior Bot to a mortal soul. With the corruption of such boundless will, We have no idea what he will believe in, we have no idea what he will fight for."

And with the tearful flight of DeMarr, all hope seemed lost.

Lost, that is, until the salvation of this world was born.

With the smoothing of his body commencing once more, little could King Keetsos have known that the life of his kingdom had been spared by the birth of a simple boy in the fabled fortress city of Lux.

ENTER KANIECKI

A fair and kindly boy, Kaniecki had been known by the people of Lux to be a blessed crystal of the Creator. Strong and erect his powers were.

It was said that his mother was a volcano, and his father the sun, and looking at the trials of this boy-prince of the east, the people of Lux said that if this legend were true, they knew one thing of this boy Kaniecki: He looked like his father.

So fair and rich was the hair of Kaniecki that it was fed to the sickly children of the city. So blue his piercing eyes that many livestock vanished at the sight of them. So great was Kaniecki's power thoguht to be, that it was said that he could inhale the air of the earth and exhale the soul of a man sitting in a faraway land.

One morn, as Kaniecki saw the smoking ruins of the Red Claw's work rising against the new sun, the Golden One took up with great haste and fled to his workshop with his tools. When he emerged, the Creator breathed a sigh of relief, for Kaniecki had emerged with a gift: the tested Battle Armor of his Father, the Sun.

And so the flag of Azural was taken up by Lord Kaniecki, and lo had the Wars of Power begun.

Nowhere near or under the sun's watchful eye could Shirella and the Claw flee from the wrath of Kaniecki. For three seasons did he stab and thrust with his mighty rod, until finally he was readied for the Great Conflict of Gorgoroth, to end this deluge of our age.

Shattering was Kaniecki's power that day. Great was his effort. So strong was he, that sweat poured off his brow and fleshy underarms like the rains of the great Boggy Marsh.

When the day appeared won, Kaniecki was felled by the simplest of things: a poisoned lance. So cunning was the Seductress Shirella, that even while she feigned death, and Kaniecki posed with his musculature above her for the forces of good, that she pricked him with her nimble Flint, and lo the day was lost.

Seeing their Captain fall, the forces of good crumbled once more. Panic struck over the land, and the Armies of Azural scattred like children from the staff of a raging Innskeeper.

At this moment, when the light of good had been extinguished, slowly did a rustle on the battlefield emerge. The wily sage DeMarr, crusting from anguish and unwash, had found the body of the Prince Kaniecki, and made off with it to his mountain sancturary of Cleveland for the last best hope of good in this world.

Quickly now did the Red Claw revamp their oppression on the freedom of Azural. After but two tidings of the Diamond Sea, the Siege of the Imperial Citadel appeared insurmountable, as the dreaded Mordred Brigade of the Red Claw, a force no man or hero had ever vanquished, seemed ready to plunder the crown of good Keetsos for their own power and fine cloths.

Slowly did Keetsos rise that morn, knowing he would soon have to abandon his people, and kneel before the supple bodice of Sirella, yet, as he opened the gates of his keep to surrender, he did not see the fearsome visage of the Mordred Brigade.

Instead, what he saw was a miracle. Ruinous and smoky were the smoking ruins of the Brigades machines of war. So total was their destruction, it was as if the Creator God Vulcos himself had brought them to their knees and axles.

As the tears of salvation welled up inside him, Gleek, the affable yet foppish jester son of the steward pointed skyward and said "Look, Look! It is our savior!"

And slowly did this new being descend on his Malthor Glide Jets. As He stood over the wondrous destruction he had undoubtedly wrought, the hearts of the people of Azural exploded in live and joy (some dying instantly from their fervor)

"Good mighty being, how may we repay you for our salvation?" Queried the aged king?

Yet this newcomer said nothing, he merely stood silent over the battlefield, his Chrome glistening in the sun and brining hope to even the most wretched beggar.

Finally, when the sorroful joy of the masses could grow no more, He spoke, "GO NOW, AND ENJOY YOUR FREEDOM AND TRADE AND FINE CLOTHS. I ASK ONLY FOR THE SUPPORT OF A BRAVE FEW, AS I MUST MAKE THIS WORLD SAFE FOR LOVE."

And with that, the glorious sentinel began to lift into the heavens, King Keetsos shouted one final exasperation:
"Wait, good sir, tell us, what is it you believe in? What is it you're fighting for?"

With a pause, the newcomer stopped:

"I BELIEVE IN THE HEART THAT HOPES FOR PEACE. I FIGHT SO THE INNOCENT WILL NOT KNOW THE SORROW OF WAR."

"ONE DAY MY NAME WILL CHANGE THE WORLD. I AM KPAX: VULCON SERIES. THE WARRIOR BOT"

And with that He was gone. The Wars of Power had finally ended. The Great Bot War had begun.

Holy Smokes

Michael Jordan was good:

Yikes

This is a fascinating read on Don Rumsfeld. as a rule, I'm always a little suspicious of any writing that unloads on someone like this, but this portion at the beginning was simply staggering to me:

on the morning of Thursday, April 10, 2003, Donald Rumsfeld’s Pentagon prepared a top-secret briefing for George W. Bush. This document, known as the Worldwide Intelligence Update, was a daily digest of critical military intelligence so classified that it circulated among only a handful of Pentagon leaders and the president; Rumsfeld himself often delivered it, by hand, to the White House. The briefing’s cover sheet generally featured triumphant, color images from the previous days’ war efforts: On this particular morning, it showed the statue of Saddam Hussein being pulled down in Firdos Square, a grateful Iraqi child kissing an American soldier, and jubilant crowds thronging the streets of newly liberated Baghdad. And above these images, and just below the headline secretary of defense, was a quote that may have raised some eyebrows. It came from the Bible, from the book of Psalms: “Behold, the eye of the Lord is on those who fear Him…To deliver their soul from death.”

This mixing of Crusades-like messaging with war imagery, which until now has not been revealed, had become routine. On March 31, a U.S. tank roared through the desert beneath a quote from Ephesians: “Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand.” On April 7, Saddam Hussein struck a dictatorial pose, under this passage from the First Epistle of Peter: “It is God’s will that by doing good you should silence the ignorant talk of foolish men.”

This certainly falls under the "What the fuck were they thinking???" umbrella, and not in the good Joe Biden way.

What Is It You Believe In?

He died in the early days of the War of Power.
Only to be reborn in Bot form.
A body of steel and a heart of lightining.
He roams.
The unrighteous have no asslylum from his wrath.
The woman who streams.
The child who cries.
Have they not need of a protector as well?
Do they not need a Champion?
Born in the sorrowfull flains of gorgoroth,
Kaniecki was born.
Grown to be a great warrior,
and slain in battle.
In Good's time of most need,
DeMarr, famed biologist of the second age created
a frame of Power wrought steel and iron,
and the creator sent a breath of life into it,
That spirit was known as Kaniecki:
But now he is known only as,
Darkness's Bain:
KPax Vulcon Series
the Warrior Bot.

Sunday Reading

The government "gets" social media. The fact that this might take off by virtue of how terrible it is is some kind of reverse irony that I'm sure the Germans have a word for.

I really hope this is real:


Interesting, new;y discovered blog - The Smart Set

Go Blackhawks!

Concert Review: The Sounds (@ the Double Door)

I don't know how many of you readers know this, but for the longest time one of my 'Out of This World, Will Never Happen' crushes has been Maja Ivarsson of Swedish new wave band The Sounds:



In any case, it certainly hasn't hurt Maja's case that I've dug the Sounds' music for quite some time. For those unfamiliar, they sing that "Hurt You" song that's featured on the Geico caveman commercial. They also sing some other songs you'd most likely regard as familiar. Here's their myspace page.

In any case, a month or so ago I found out they were playing the Double Door and got tickets. I went with Gower and another of our friends; two key statistics about the crowd:

- 70% hipster
- 70% female

Before I describe the performance, let me put in a word about the opening act, Hey Champ:

This band kicks ass. Their music is original and their performance is nonpareil. They're tightly (without seeming programmed) and have a wonderful flair for the causally dramatic. Additionally, there's a sense of fun & rhetorical flourish about their act and the drummer fucking rocks. I can't say enough about them, except that they're playing the Empty Bottle on May 16th.

Now, on to the main event. To cut directly to the chase, I have to say I was somewhat underwhelmed by the Sounds, but their performance was understandable to me. Technically, the music was very tight, and the way the band replicated their CD sound was extremely impressive, superior to what I would have expected from a tech-y newwave band (especially one from Sweden). The problem was, though, that The Sounds seem to no longer be a club band, they're an arena band now. The interplay between the band members was pretty clearly rehearsed and the stage act felt suspiciously like it had been boiled down to a science. Another tell was the fact that Ivarsson's natural vantage point towards the crowd seemed to be 35-40 feet off stage. On a tour stage in a football stadium, this would look pretty natural, but in a low-cielinged club like the Double Door, it was sterilizing.

Something else that caught my attention is the fact that the band's own songs seemed old to them. Not necessarily stale, or boring, just well worn. You know that feeling when you're working out to music and to give yourself an extra kick you put on an old standby and for whatever reason (you're tired, heard it too many times, your foot hurts, etc.) it doesn't really turn on the jets for you? That describes the Lion's share of this entire set. When they got to performing new singles off their upcoming album ("Crossing the Rubicon") the level of animation picked up considerably.

On the whole, I'd give the Sounds performance 71 thumbs up out of 100 (for comparison, Hey Champ received 88 thumbs up out of 100). I understand the pitfalls of reading too much into any one performance; maybe they just didin't have their fastball last Thursday. That being said, my professional amateur opinion that this is more simply a case of venue mismatch than anything. Had I been in even a mid-sized ampitheater, almost none of the nits described above would have presented themselves. To be succinct, I wouldn't say that sitting in on this performance made me any less of a fan of the band, but it did make me less likely to see them again in person.


(post script: For all those of you wondering: no, I did not hook up with Maja Ivarsson. I figured she's in the middle of a tour and probably has a lot on her mind. the last thing she needs right now is to get involved with an up-and-coming young blogger.)

Lou Bertuca vs. St. Ignatius, Freshman Year A Team Basketball

Wow

This is worth checking out. The first five minutes are like a recruiting video for the Soviet Union.

But Where Was I Going?

There are those small, esoteric vanities that we all like to indulge in. "I was Mrs. Horton's all-time favorite student." "I went 6 months without losing to my roommates in video-game football," etc. Well, I am pleased to inform you dear readers that I have resumed my assault on the record books of Irrelevance because as of yesterday, May 4th, 2009, I can say with a high degree of certainty that I am the only living human to have attended the Kentucky Derby and a Fastball concert in the same weekend.

Who is Fastball, you ask? Why, surely you remember that pretty popular late 90's rock trio. If you don't, here's a reminder - the pianist Tony really sounds like Elvis Costello:



(ordinarily here I would include an odd or particularly random bit from the band's Wikipedia entry. Unfortunately, in addition to I'm pretty sure having been written by the band itself, this particular corner of Wikipedia is really pretty boring)

Now, back to the topic at hand. Some highlights from the trip to Kentucky:

- I met an exceedingly nice man at the gas station in Lebanon, IN (which, for the record, looked like a pretty legit town and has a top-notch website as far as small-town websites go). He filled me in on the best places to fish nearby. I do not own a fishing pole but it was still generous of him to share.

- The Kentucky Derby was a ball as expected. I drank a lot of whiskey. I saw a lot of pretty girls in pretty hats. I also saw a lot of public urination. Pretty frequently, all three of these things happened at once.

- I met the most in-shape older woman in the world. She was shepherding around a group of teenage(?) girls, none of whom were taller than 4'10." I can't remember if they were gymnasts or synchronized swimmers or what, but I do remember this: after talking with this woman, we figured out that she used to babysit a guy I went to high school with. Small world, huh?

- On the way back, I stopped in West Lafayette, IN and had what is unequivocally the worst cup of coffee I will ever have in my life. Ordinarily, I don't distinguish between such things; coffee is coffee, but this stuff was truly horrid. It tasted like a muppet's bathwater.

The drive home was pretty nice. I stopped off in Oak Park to see my parents for a bit, helped a couple of buddies move some stuff into their new place and then returned my rental car, getting home around 4 p.m. I said hello to Gower, found out about his weekend and then we decided to make the most of our day. We headed over Phyllis' Musical Inn to sit in the beer garden and have a cocktail like gentlemen. While at Phyllis' (where I beat a really unfriendly girl in a game of H-O-R-S-E), we were Gower and I were having such a good time that we decided we were going to let it ride and take in a show that night. Digging up a copy of the Chicago Reader, we saw the Empty Bottle's listing for the night looked something like this:

FASTBALL
WAYATT

Wait, could we be so lucky? Was Fastball really playing the Empty Bottle on a random Sunday night? Was it just some band called 'Fastball Wayatt'? Were the guys from Fastball even still alive? Well, there was only one way to find out, so we tied our shoes, walked over to Western asked the hipster dudes at the door, paid our $15 and prepared to let the waves of nostolgia overtake us.

Something strange about the crowd that night: a lot of older folks. It's not that I have a problem with that in any way, but I'm pretty sure a full third of the audience was comprised of family members of the opening band. Another out-of-place thing I noticed was a girl standing against the wall by herself, crying fitfully. I went over to ask her if everything was OK and from the ensuing conversation I gathered three distinct pieces of information:

1. This girl was major league crazy. I've had girls send me hate messages about sex with robots and I've had girls sneak into my apartment at 3:30 a.m., so believe me I do not throw that term around lightly.

2. This girl was really, really, really drunk (this may have informed large parts of item 1, above). I thought long and hard about doing a bar version of a citizen's arrest and taking her beer away from her. I couldn't make out a ton of what she was saying but I did pick up on the following:

3. She was divorced and her ex-husband (perhaps her ex-husband's best friend, it wasn't clear) is in the band Fastball.

Upon hearing Item 3, I felt pretty bad about myself because the opening stages of our interaction had gone like this:

GIRL: [crying]

ME: "What's wrong? Is everything ok?"

GIRL: [sniffle, dries her eyes] "Nothing, it's fine, forget it."

ME: (trying to make a good-natured joke) "Hey, it's ok. I always get emotional before Fastball shows, too."

Needless to say, she didn't laugh at that. And I don't think it was because she was too drunk to understand what I was saying. We talked kind of uncomfortably for a few more minutes when I excused myself and told her I was going to get another beer. She acted like she didn't believe me and then went off into the bathroom. When she came out, Fastball had started playing.

The guys from Fastball seemed to be pretty cool and didn't have any of the "You know, we don't need this, we used to play football stadiums" vibe you might expect from a group that's down on their luck. That didn't change the fact, though, that things were about to get a little awkward. The girl/ex-wife/friend's ex-wife spent the first part of their set maybe two inches from the stage, alternating between shouting the band members' names at them or else mouthing along every word to every Fastball song ever made. Then, between tunes, when the guys from Fastball would try to introduce their next song, she'd scream over them to "Play the hits! People want to hear the hits!"

I can't imagine many people there knew all the elements at play, but everyone in the bar was keenly aware of a high quotient of 'What the fuck is going on?'

To the Fastballers' credit, they were pretty self-effacing in defusing(?) the situation, pointing out that being a One Two-Hit Wonders was indeed still better than being a Zero-Hit Wonders.

Eventually, the woman tired herself out and spent the second-half of the set in semi-consciousness at a table partway towards the back of the bar. All in all it was one of the better two-day stretches of the last ten years for me.