07/31/03’s illustrious band:

Dark & Stormy

Brought to you by the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest.

“It was a dark and stormy night; the rain fell in torrents -- except at occasional intervals, when it was checked by a violent gust of wind which swept up the streets (for it is in London that our scene lies), rattling along the housetops, and fiercely agitating the scanty flame of the lamps that struggled against the darkness.”

So reads the first line of the novel Paul Clifford, written by Edward George Bulwer-Lytton (1830). Its literary awfulness has inspired a yearly contest in which writers compete to see who can produce the worst opening sentence for a fictional book of their own. Visit www.bulwer-lytton.com to find this year’s results. All the winners are so . . . uh . . . outstanding that I can’t pick a favorite, although there’s a soft spot in my heart (and possibly in my head) for the Vile Pun division.

Think you can do better? You have my address. No fair submitting corporate memos or documents in legalese!

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07/30/03’s illustrious band:

The Dangling Freuds

Brought to you by Sister-san, Jen X and the Soup Group. And their mothers, of course.

Sister-san recently gave me the gift of a Sigmund Freud action figure. He looks sort of like a fierce Colonel Sanders in a grey suit. As you’d expect, he’s holding a tiny cigar in his right hand. His arms are posable, but only up to a point, so he can’t actually smoke the cigar. His packaging (which is much larger than the figure itself; remind you of anything?) sports some interesting information about Freud and some pithy quotations from the good doctor.

A former psych major, I found the figure very funny. He’s been a hit at the office, too. Dr. Freud accompanied the Soup Group to lunch yesterday, where he was passed around like a talking stick. Whoever was holding Freud felt moved to reveal deep-seated secrets about his or her family life and hidden motivations. Speakers who seemed on the verge of a breakthrough or a Freudian slip were invited to tell it to the doctor. When not in someone’s hand, Freud presided over the table, propped on his bent arms on the rim of a water glass. Every party should have a Freud to keep the conversation flowing.

Naturally, my friends wanted to know where they could find Freud figures of their own. A few minutes’ diligent research revealed an excellent source: Archie McPhee toys at www.mcphee.com. Not only can you find Freud action figures, but also Rosie the Riveter, Jesus and Moses (sold separately), Benjamin Franklin (complete with plastic kite and key!), a set of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine crew people, and a set of 8 miniature debutantes. And much, much more!!

You really owe it to yourself, and anyone on your gift list, to check this site out. Be sure to click on the Enlightenment categories, where the sections include, in addition to Buddhism, Christianity, Nuns, Hinduism and Judaism, such spiritual classics as Devils, Elvis and Voodoo. And don’t miss Tiki Island, where you can find tiki lights, coasters, masks and swizzle sticks -- pretty much everything but an inflatable tiki god. Other finds include:

• In the Lifestyle category, there’s a whole section on bowling. Want a bowling bag-shaped purse? Click here!
  
• Want to see 10 variations on the Magic 8 Ball? Visit the Amusements category, Magic Balls section!
  
• Need a new rubber chicken? Amusements, under Classics.
  
• Fresh out of cocktail monkeys? Look no further than the Top 12 Items list.
  
• Thinking of giving your brother-in-law a shower curtain emblazoned with cuts of meat as a housewarming gift? Lifestyle category under Hygiene.

  
  

I could go on and on -- oops, too late! -- but I’ll let you discover some of the finer features for yourselves. Don’t bother buying me the kung fu coaster set as a thank-you gift for steering you to Archie McPhee, though. I already ordered myself a set.

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07/29/03’s illustrious band:

Mr. Sun and the Inflatable Tiki God

Brought to you by Senor Editor’s birthday. Feliz cumpleanos, Senor!

The moral of the story is, don’t leave your office unattended around your birthday. If you take a day off or something, your colleagues might sneak in there and hang a big, grinning sun from your ceiling or set a hideous Mylar centerpiece on your desk or something. An inflatable centerpiece featuring the glaring visage of a primitive tiki god, for instance, with a bouquet of streamers in the middle. They might festoon your office with crepe paper in tropical colors and gift-wrap your mouse. They might hang up a photo of you in the company booth at a trade show, your background electronically altered to read “Kissing Booth,” with a list of steadily decreasing prices crossed out and the word “Please?” written beneath.

Of course, they might also bring in fresh strawberries and key lime pie, and they might offer to take you to lunch, too. They might even let you play with their new Sigmund Freud action figure. But they won’t make you wear the smiley-face button or the balloon hat. That would be going too far.

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07/28/03’s illustrious band:

Longest & Strongest

Brought to you by my tireless bridge coaches.

My efforts to learn to play bridge continued this weekend. I seem to be getting the hang of some of the more elementary points of the game now. I have a better idea of whether I should bid or pass, how to up the ante if I am bidding, and when to play certain cards. I’ve taken the advice “fourth from your longest and strongest suit” to heart; it appears to mean “play ‘em if you’ve got ‘em.” I’ve also found that it helps to cut down on the sangria and pay more attention to who’s playing what and whether I know where all the high cards are hiding.

I still don’t get the scoring system, though. I managed to win us a 700-point rubber without even knowing what one is. A very, very large eraser, perhaps? Every so often during last night’s game, the scorekeeper would look down at his hieroglyphic notations and announce that one or both teams had nothing on. I don’t know where he got that idea; we weren’t playing strip bridge or anything. Well, most of us did take our shoes off.

The bridge game was a nice way to cap off a nice weekend. I attended classes, did some reading and caught up on household chores. Got the lawn mowed, the cats petted and a plant repotted. I ate mulberries ripe from the tree, staining my fingernails purple with the juice.

I also indulged my puzzle game fetish by buying Super Collapse II online. Great, great game! In the original version, you click on groups (the longest & strongest groups) of same-colored blocks, which disappear from the stack and allow the rest to collapse back down to the baseline. Easy, right? Not when the bricks are coming a mile a minute and refusing to group themselves conveniently!

In version II, you have the option of having blocks appear from two directions -- top or bottom -- or of tackling intricate symmetrical patterns to see if you can make all the blocks disappear. All very silly and time-consuming; a video game nerd’s version of beach reading, or a game of bridge.

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07/25/03’s illustrious band:

Mug on a Stick

Brought to you by Sister-san.

Once upon a time, Sister-san and her husband Brother-in-Law-san were invited to an anniversary party for BIL-san’s parents. BIL had to work and couldn’t go, so Sister-san traveled solo. However, she took him with her in spirit -- and in the form of a photograph of his face that she enlarged and glued to a stick. So BIL’s smiling mug appears in all the pictures, even though he wasn’t there.

Not what you were expecting, right? Not you Minnesotans, anyway. With Minnesota State Fair season coming up, you were expecting me to say something about fair fare, which is traditionally served on a stick, often deep-fried. In addition to the usual corn dogs (called Pronto Pups around here) and shishkabobs, you can also get alligator on a stick, pork chop on a stick, meatballs on a stick, s’mores on a stick, tater skins on a stick, egg rolls on a stick, pizza on a stick, pretzel on a stick, battered dill pickle on a stick, even macaroni and cheese on a stick.

And let’s not forget last year’s newcomer to the scene, deep-fried candy bars on a stick. I tried a bite of one last year, because of course I had to, and one bite was enough, even for me. A whole candy bar is generally too much anyway. But if they’d been dipping and frying the bite-size Snickers, etc., well . . . I hear Twinkies are next.

Or maybe you took the “mug on a stick” reference literally and were expecting a discussion of balancing feats such as those described in my latest literary acquisition, Virtuosos of Juggling, a book on the history of juggling and similar arts. There are people in this book who do indeed balance cups or mugs on sticks on their foreheads. As if that weren’t enough, some of them will then juggle smaller objects and catch them in the cup. Cool!

Anyway, that’s my schtick on a stick for today. I’m off for a wild weekend of doing not very much. Looking forward to it!

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07/23/03’s illustrious band:

West on Faith

Brought to you by the immanent departure from our midst of Amy 2.0.

Amy is moving to Seattle. Why? Because it seems like the right thing to do. She isn’t moving to accommodate a partner, care for ailing relatives or take a new job (though one will turn up in time). She’s moving because . . . well, because. She has faith that things will work out the way they ought to. So far, that faith has proven well placed.

For instance: Plans for this move have been fraught with obstacles. Amy wanted to sell her townhome more quickly than she did but ended up waiting for her buyer to get some things in order. Rather than dump the slow buyer and look for a new one, Amy had faith that this buyer was the right one, and waited. And it was a good thing she did! Had she pushed for a faster sale, she would have ended up paying a financial penalty; completing the transaction at a later date allowed her to avoid it. Faith!

This faith that Someone is watching out for us is just one of the things I’ll miss about Amy. One of many things. I’ll also miss girls’ night at the chamber orchestra, decadent Academy Awards parties, infectious laughter, a willing ear for my cat stories, and her refusal to indulge my cynical streak. Who’s going to organize the North American Sushi Club now? Who’s going to make sure the Soup Group dines out regularly? Who’s going to remind me to look past circumstantial evidence for deeper meaning?

It’s tempting to be sad when a friend moves away, and I’m giving in to that temptation a little bit. But I’m also excited for Amy and eager to see how her adventure will play itself out. She won’t be that far away, being always part of my heart. And I’m going to visit, too. So it’s not "farewell," it’s "see you later."

And it's "Admire you lots!" Because who else but Amy would have the guts -- or the faith -- to do this?

I haven’t given Amy a going-away present because I figure she doesn’t need one more thing to pack right now. However, once she’s settled in her new home, I’ll be mailing out a Seattle Starter Kit. I have a few ideas already for what to put in it. All contributions welcome!

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07/22/03’s illustrious band:

Airplanehome

Brought to you by www.airplanehome.com, via the newspaper column of my literary hero, James Lileks.

You know how some people will make a home out of an old warehouse, barn, schoolhouse, church, bus or train car? Airplanehome.com features a home made out of a retired Boeing 727. Yup, they just put that sucker up on blocks and voila! The friendly skies come down to earth. The reader who pointed out this site to Mr. Lileks, and therefore to the rest of us, said she’d like to buy a 747 home if she won the lottery, install a flight simulator in the cockpit, and let drunken friends “fly” the house.

This brings up the obvious question, of course: What would you turn into a home if you won the lottery, or just had a lot of time on your hands to do the remodeling? A couple of obvious (to me) choices:

• Bookstore. Restrooms and comfy chairs already in place. On-site café. Excellent built-in CD selection, and, of course, no shortage of reading material. Drawbacks: None that I can see.

  
  

• Airport. No need to catch a cab to the airport at some ungodly hour of the morning; just fire up the golf cart and hustle down the hall. Perfect for the frequent flier. Of course, finding parking even in your own garage would be a huge chore, you’d never know where your clothes were, and then there’s the matter of cabbies tossing cigarette butts all over the front walk.

  
  

• Furniture store. No problem finding seats for all your friends at the next big party, and you could sleep in a different, tastefully decorated bedroom every night. But watching those flat, cardboard TVs would get boring after a while -- if you could distinguish the programming from real TV.

  
  

• Home Depot. Everything you need to construct, plumb and wire that extra room -- or demolish it -- is right at your fingertips. No delivery hassles. On the other hand, none of the fixtures in the model bathrooms work.

  
  

• Playground habitrail. Kids do it in their imaginations all the time; why not make that elaborate redwood play structure your home for real? You could slide down the slide or the fireman’s pole and race across the street for dinner just like in the old days. It’d be a little breezy during the colder months, and you might have a bit of a splinter problem, but when you’re exploring the world in a pirate vessel/spaceship, who cares?

  
  

Where do you want to live, boys and girls?

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07/21/03’s illustrious band:

Warrior Weekend

Brought to you by a weekend’s worth of special seminars with Grandmaster Wai-Lun Choi.

Every so often, the T’ai Chi studio sponsors seminars with a visiting instructor. This weekend we were treated to several sessions with Master Choi, world-recognized lineageholder in Liu Ho Pa Fa (12 Animals kung fu) and expert in several other styles. It was like going to music camp and getting piano lessons from Mozart.

To say that my brain is full would be an understatement. Studying with Master Choi requires great both physical and mental stamina. Reason number one is that he’s Chinese and speaks English with an accent, so you really have to tune in to understand what he’s saying. I managed to glean maybe 40 to 50% of his meaning -- which was plenty.

Also, Master Choi knows just about everything there is to know about the systems he teaches. Forty-some years’ worth of theory, practice and scholarship are yours for the taking if you listen and pay attention. The only catch is, it all comes at once, so while you’re on Step 1: Where to Put Your Feet, Master Choi is on to Step 7: Now You Tie Him in a Knot Like a Boy Scout. “So simple!” he says with a grin. “Yougettheideanow?” Thank goodness the sessions were videotaped.

Yeah, the grin. Sifu (“Master”) is famous for what we call the Choi Chuckle: his tendency to smile or laugh while executing a self-defense technique. While health and meditation are good reasons to study martial arts, Master Choi’s true focus is on fighting. He delights in the practical applications of his art, and he’s very, very good at them. In 1971 he won the Southeast Asian Hand-to-Hand Martial Arts Tournament, earning the nickname Canon Fist. And when he opened his studio in Chicago’s Chinatown in 1972, he defeated 36 challengers in about half an hour to prove his credentials to the old-school crowd. To get that good, you have to think of fighting as your favorite thing in the world, Sifu says. Like chocolate. If he comes after you with that kid-in-a-candy-store smile, you know you’re about to become a snack.

So while you’re trying to grasp the basics of breathing and not getting killed, there’s a 64-year-old man trotting around the studio demonstrating, correcting and demonstrating some more. He’s the only person in the room who can sink down to tap the floor, then pop up for an overhead kick, not just once but several times, and the only one not panting after several rounds of the crouch-jump-crouch-jump Dragon exercise. Knees of steel! It was over 80 degrees in the studio all weekend, with humidity above 75%, but Master Choi perspired only a little and never stopped laughing.

So yeah, he wore me out, but in a good way. This may be the last time Master Choi comes to town, so I’m glad I got a chance to be his student for a few hours. I’m still a long way from mastering the secrets of whole-body haaaaamony, but after this weekend, I’m a tiny bit closer.

Editor's note: I saw a brief ad on TV for an upcoming series titled The Mullets, a sitcom (it had better be!) that apparently features a bunch of guys sporting the hairstyle Skeeter pointed out to us last week (www.mulletsgalore.com). Be very afraid!

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07/18/03’s illustrious band:

Mullet Over

Brought to you by Skeeter, who grew up among mullets but turned out OK anyway. I'm talking about the mullet hairstyle, not the fish. You know, the mudflap. Hockey hair. The "business in front, party in back" redneck fashion bomb.

In my continuing quest for the path of greatest amusement, I pass along this link to the Coiffure Hall of Shame, www.mulletsgalore.com. Hair heresy! Stone the hairetics!

No time for more today; I'm off to a weekend full of supersized teachings with a visiting kung fu master. I'll tell you all about it next week.

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07/17/03’s illustrious band:

Frankfurter Converter

Brought to you by The Frankfurter Converter, a wondrous pork byproduct-to-calamari transmutation device you can find at http://octodog.net. It can be yours for only $16.95 (+ $5.95 shipping/handling)! Go see for yourself.

If that figure causes you, like Lise the Flying Nurse, to exclaim "Got dandruff! Some of it itches!" you're not alone. We've entered the hot dog days of summer.

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07/16/03’s illustrious band:

Sons of Dan Bennett

Brought to you by the Nerf curses people sent me after yesterday’s installment.

Sister-san writes:

Nerf curses, eh? I’ve got at least 3 good ones that we were talking about just this weekend when some friends were here with us:

Shiite Muslims
Shift-F7

Both of those two are valuable if you have already started to make the sh- sounds and then decide to censor yourself at the last instant.

My third curse contribution is one that probably makes sense only to people familiar with my ol’ alma mater, MSUM, and one of its smallest campus buildings: Flora Frick Hall. That oft-overlooked building is really no more than a passageway connecting two other halls, but, lest it be forgotten forever, it is immortalized in frequent exclamations to the effect of “What the Flora Frick...?!?!?”

Editor’s note: In the Microsoft Word word processing program, which both Sister-san and I use frequently in our work, the key combination Shift-F7 is what you hit to access the built-in thesaurus -- the feature you use to find other words to replace the one you’re thinking of.

The Hammer adds:

Sister-in-law Betty's favorite Nerf curse is "O-p-d-q-x" Try it. Saying those 5 letters does blow off a fair amount of steam as they are quite "spittable!"

Let's not forget shitake mushrooms. I’m also reminded of a high school classmate who was fond of exclaiming “Cheese and rice!” when frustrated. And of course there’s a whole list you can get from the 1984 movie Johnny Dangerously, which brings us such near-miss classics as fargin’, bastage and icehole.

Thanks to today’s contributors. Keep on cussin’!

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07/15/03’s illustrious band:

Dan Bennett

Brought to you by Magic.

Dan Bennett is known to Magic and their friends as the man whose name is a pseudo-cuss phrase, or a Nerf curse. Like a Nerf ball, a Nerf curse can be tossed about without causing too much alarm. Drop something? Mutter “Dan Bennett.” Stub your toe? “Dan Bennett!” That’s great for the rest of us, but probably kind of annoying for poor Dan.

Nerf curses are useful for blowing off small amounts of steam without offending anyone. High on my list are family swearlooms like “ratzle fratzle,” which my Dad used when I was too little to be exposed to the real thing, and “sheeeooooot faaaahr,” a common utterance from Aunt Eva, whose semi-Southern drawl can wring at least four syllables from these words. (However, no one is sure whether she’s saying “shoot far” or “shoot fire.” Doesn’t matter, I guess.) I’ve picked up a new one from the Harry Potter books: boggart. In the literature, a boggart is an apparition that takes a scary form; I use the word anywhere I might otherwise say Dan Bennett.

My literary hero James Lileks (www.lileks.com) recently made Nerf curses a feature of his newspaper column. People wrote in with their favorites and amusing anecdotes about their origins. I invite others to do the same.

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07/14/03’s illustrious band:

Cooking with Plastics

Brought to you by a booklet by the same name sent to Media Headquarters by the American Plastics Council.

Cooking with Plastics. What does that make you think of off the top of your head? If I picked up a book titled Cooking with Turkey, I’d look for turkey recipes inside. If I picked up a book titled Cooking with Spinach, I’d expect to find creative ways of working spinach into my meals. So when I opened Cooking with Plastics for the first time, naturally I expected to read about how I could incorporate nice, tasty petrochemical products into my diet. It might be culinarily unorthodox, but surely the American Plastics Council would not steer me wrong.

Well, it’s a good thing I didn’t judge the book by its cover. What the APC really wanted to bring me was “A menu for storing, cooking and serving great food” in plastic containers. I was a little disappointed, to tell you the truth. I already know how to burp my Tupperware; I was looking for a high-tech way to kick my diet into the 21st century. Instead I was treated to lessons like “Seal in freshness, flavor and nutrients with plastic wrap, containers and bags” and “You also can use plastic bags and wrap to batch and store soups, stews, casseroles and other dishes.” You don’t say!

There’s plenty of clever self-promotion between the lines of Cooking with Plastics, too. Tips include putting just about every food item you buy into plastic containers for storage and throwing out old ones after a while -- which means you need to buy more of them.

Your child’s school lunch is an especially important place to display your plastic prowess. There’s a whole section on how to make a wrap sandwich (with a tortilla, not to be confused with plastic wrap) and store it in plastic, how to put fruit and veggie chunks or pasta salad into plastic containers and how to pour soup into a plastic thermos. If you don’t plasticize your child’s entire meal, you’re a bad parent. Believe it! The American Plastics Council says so!

The Microwave Magic chapter is my favorite. This is where the actual cooking with plastics takes place. Here you’ll learn that microwaves heat food unevenly, but you can improve the odds by cutting the food up and stirring it (in its plastic container) during cooking. But don’t heat food in packaging cartons or restaurant takeout boxes; put it in plastic instead. When you’re done, store the leftovers in plastic bowls. And don’t forget to put fresh produce into plastic bags to keep it fresher longer.

Not that I’m knocking plastics. I use far more than my share of single-serving plastic bowls and baggies, and I take my trash out in big plastic baggies. I collect my cats’ litter box waste in plastic receptacles, which I then stash in plastic bags for disposal in the plastic garbage can. My CD case? Plastic. My toothbrush? Plastic. My phone? Plastic. My favorite pens? Plastic. My cheap windbreaker? Plastic. My reading glasses and sunglasses? Plastic (but they’re not called reading plastics or sun plastics). My money? Plastic. Until a couple years ago, even my car was plastic (I drove a Saturn). I think the APC is wasting its time trying to sell me plastics. Numerous other industries have been too successful already.

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07/10/03’s illustrious band:

Golleminem

Day 3 of CONvergence week is brought to you by sci-fi fandom’s very own rap star.

CONvergence is indeed a time/place of convergence -- in this case, the unlikely blending of Middle Earth with the equally fantastic world of contemporary hip-hop music. Both places are populated by funny-talking guys in funny-looking clothes, but that’s where the similarities usually end.

But then you find that rarest of creatures, a nerd with rhythm: Golleminem. He’s part Gollum, the wasted shadow-man from Lord of the Rings, and part Eminem, the wasted shadow-man of the white-boy rap scene (but without the obscenities). Glaze-eyed with desire for a certain magical ring, Golleminem rants his way from one side of the stage to the other, hitting the high points of a tale too complex to be covered in just a few verses. If you don’t know the story, he’s just a funny-looking guy with a so-so singing voice, but to insiders, he’s Elvis.

Golleminem was the best part of the CONvergence Masquerade, or costume contest, this year. Unfortunately, he was first on stage and gone within 5 minutes, and the rest of the show was downhill from there. I don’t mean to say that the costumes were bad; they were creative and well made and displayed by shy geeks attempting performance art. (Anybody out there remember Rainbow Brite?) But there were only about 15, and the best ones never made it to the stage. Due to the long rehearsal for the Masquerade, which takes a big chunk out of a con-going day, most people who dress up opt not to enter the competition.

So amongst the usual Klingons, Borg, Matrix sleeksters, bug-eyed aliens, Medieval royalty and Jedi knights roamed a pair of perfect Mario Brothers who looked like they’d just stepped off the video game screen and a guy dressed entirely in blinking lights. Fat fairies and gaunt Goths rubbed shoulders with Dr. Who and a pack of werewolves. And then there was me, of course, in my plain blue jeans and a Mr. Spock T-shirt.

Yep, the best parade is that of imaginative people just being themselves. But I did especially like the faded black shirt that read “Do not place in direct sunlight.”

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07/09/03’s illustrious band:

Slot Cars of the Living Dead

Day 2 of CONvergence Week is brought to you by one of the three or so dozen room parties in the cabana rooms overlooking the hotel pool area.

Like several of the much-touted room parties at this year’s con, the Living Dead party was more dead than living when I wandered past (which doesn’t mean it didn’t liven up later, of course). I was intrigued by the posters for this party, which contributed greatly to the palimpsest of literature papering the hotel walls. But there were no living dead, brain-eating zombies on display in the suite. Just a TV playing an old movie, and a kid’s slot car track set up on a table. Slot cars? I missed the connection to science fiction, but I did spend several minutes watching the hypnotic spin of the tiny cars through their loop-de-loops. Maybe that was the point.

I also dropped by Captain Kirk’s House of Ill Repute a couple times but came away disappointed. Star Trek’s Captain Kirk, if you’ll recall, was notorious for making out with any and every attractive female life form in the galaxy, human or not, so I figured a Kirk party would be pretty wild and crazy. But the place was deserted every time I happened past. Maybe all the make-out artists decided to get their own rooms.

Editor’s note: You should be laughing right now. I just suggested that con geeks could actually get some action.

Other parties did a better job of living up to their billing. I returned, like a moth to a glowing heating element, to last year’s hands-down favorite, the House of Toast. (HOT note: The interior of the room is draped with silvery fabric and strewn with strips of red lights so it looks like you’re inside a giant toaster.) The HOT people were again serving, at the front of the room, several flavors of toasted bread with a bewildering variety of toppings (including Chef Boy R De beef ravioli), and at the back, vegetarian sushi rolled while you wait. Can’t beat a combo like that.

I placed an unimaginative order for whole wheat topped with grape jelly. As I waited out the heating process, I took part in the great debate rocking the House. You see, every time a slice of the house specialty popped up, a server would yell “Toast!” And every time a sushi roll was completed, a server would holler “Sushi!” Soon the crowd took up the opposing chants -- “Toast!” “Sushi!” -- in the vein of “Less filling!” “Tastes great!” I lent my lung power to the cause of toast, of course. But finally somebody bellowed “WASABI!!” And everybody could agree on wasabi, so the rumble was off.

My second favorite room party turned out to be Vice City, the only venue serving ice cream. I quality-checked several samples and found all to be in order, including the colorful candy sprinkles. The Vice squad’s signature drink was that summertime favorite, spiked lemonade, but it was really more like lemonade-tinted spike. If any making out occurred at this con, that drink had a lot more to do with it than Captain Kirk did.

There were several different Klingon parties, as usual, including a beach bash and a trial of the reviled war criminal Jar Jar Binks that ended, naturally enough, in execution. I never quite made it into the open-mike music performance party, nor the dream interpretation suite. But I did have a dandy time and even found some jugglers to play with for a little while. How juggling relates to science fiction, I don’t know, but nobody cared. My mission was to sample a smorgasbord of enjoyments, and I succeeded.

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07/08/03’s illustrious band:

Couch Parade

Brought to you by my most recent adventures at CONvergence, the science fiction-fantasy convention I attended this past weekend. This week’s illustrious bands will be singing the event’s praises.

At this year’s con, I spent a lot of time at Cinema Rex, the movie room. In the space of 48 hours, I saw two complete films and parts of several more, and could easily have doubled my intake. Although Cinema Rex looks like a mere hotel conference room papered with movie posters, it’s really the best-ever theater setup you can imagine. There’s a 10-foot screen in one corner, flanked by banks of surround-sound speakers only an audio-visual nerd could love -- and the con is full of them. A faithful few keep a nonstop procession of sci-fi flicks going for an average of 13.66 hours a day, every day of the con, projected from DVDs or Laserdiscs for the sharpest image.

Don’t let the technology fool you, though. Rex pays an equal amount of attention to comfort. The room is jammed with more squashy couches and armchairs than the Gryffindor common room -- or, for the Harry Potter-impaired, your favorite coffee shop lounge. There are plenty of end tables upon which to set your drink or your feet, and lamps to replace fluorescent lighting between movies. It’s the perfect place to chill for an hour or two if you’re tired from prowling the dealers’ room or skipping from one room party to another. And the sofa backs are high enough that you can scrunch down out of sight if you’re being followed by a giant, manic repo man who really wants to be your friend (see subsequent blogs).

But what’s a movie party without popcorn? Or a free soda dispenser? Or free cookies, candy, and, on opening night, free pizza? Not just any crummy old pizza, either. Cinema Rex serves Green Mill. Not even the con suite, where you can get free food any time of day or night, can compete with that.

With such quality in every detail, Cinema Rex is the king of movie houses. The only other place half so inviting is the 30-foot-long hotel hot tub, but they don’t show movies there. However, the parade of pasty-white geek flesh is almost as entertaining.

E-mail the Media Sensation: jugglernaut@hotmail.com

Visit the BND archives at http://jugglernaut.blogspot.com.

07/01/03’s illustrious band:

Don’t Call Us . . .

Brought to you by our monthly reading from the Book of Spam.

Despite centuries of fine-tuned native cuisine, Asian countries have developed a strange affinity for that gustatory johnny-come-lately, Spam. Japan is the world’s third-largest consumer of the processed pink product, following close on the heels of Guam and Hawaii. South Korea consumes quite a bit, too, and even considers Spam a delicacy. Blame the large U.S. military influence, I guess.

Speaking of Spam: If you’re tired of spammish phone calls from telemarketers, you can finally do something about it! Either by phone or online, you can register your home or cell phone number with the FTC’s new Do Not Call list! Either call 1-888-382-1222 from the phone you want protected or log on to www.donotcall.gov to register electronically. (Note: Until July 7, that phone number is only good for states west of the Mississippi, including Minnesota; after that it’s good nationwide. Reason: keeping call volume at a level the system can handle.)

The service should block about 80 percent of telemarketing calls, according to the FTC. People who sign up this summer should see the drop-off after the FTC begins enforcing the list on October 1.

I suggest the online method; it took me about 30 seconds to do mine this morning. You type in the phone number you don’t want called, they e-mail you for confirmation within a few minutes (seconds, in my case) you click the link to confirm, and you're done. WORTH IT! Go now! No more interrupted dinner hours -- no matter what you’re eating.

E-mail the Media Sensation: jugglernaut@hotmail.com

Visit the BND archives at http://jugglernaut.blogspot.com.