Lone Locust Productions

Author: Eugene Glover

  • Doctor Who – The Impossible Planet – Review

    I’m beginning to feel like I’m heaping superlative on top of superlative for the season’s reviews of Doctor Who, but I simply can’t help saying that the Impossible Planet is possibly the best looking Doctor Who episode ever made. It is certainly, without doubt, the finest use of a quarry as a location ever, bar none.

    Clearly the producers know it, too, as the follow-up Doctor Who Confidential episode concentrates on “the look”. The episodes sets and effects look like they belong in a very big-budget movie, but at the same time have a very convincing look to them. It’s truly stunning to look at.

    If that was all it had going for it would still be an impressive episode, but it isn’t. Although it’s the first half of a two-parter and the story isn’t complete yet, it’s been great so far.

    The Doctor and Rose arrive on an “impossible” planet – One that is orbiting a black hole. A mining team from Earth is there investigating the amazing power source that is preventing the planet from falling into the black hole.

    It cannot be coincidence that this two-parter straddles June 6, 2006. The idiotically tenuous connection between 6/6/06 and the mythical mark of the beast, 666 is being played up as the release date of the new Omen movie, and even some seriously deranged people are trying to induce the birth of their children early in order to avoid giving birth to the anti-christ.

    Amid this insanity in the real world, the Doctor arrives just as the beast awakes from his long sleep (imprisonment) in the black hole.

    The story is thick with tension and the pacing is just about right. I’ve only a couple of minor criticisms. This first is that the TARDIS cannot translate some ancient writing found on the planet. Having made the TARDIS a miracle device which translates everything, this is a poor contrivance to get around not having the alien inscriptions understood too early.

    it does raise an interesting idea that was briefly explored in the Christmas Invasion. As the Doctor recovers (not the TARDIS), suddenly all the humans near the TARDIS begin to understand the aliens. Clearly, the field generated by the TARDIS is not exclusive to the travelers in the TARDIS, therefore, does this mean where ever the TARDIS lands, all the people in the area suddenly begin to be able to understand foreign/alien languages. This episode explicitly indicates that written words should appear as English to Rose also, so does this also extend to all the people around the TARDIS?

    One can only imagine the confusion if the TARDIS landed in a group of multilingual people, or somewhere where someone was studying a foreign text and suddenly could read it.

    Alas, the TARDIS’ ability to translate has always been rather poorly thought out and inconsistently utilized.

    The second problem with the episode are the bit where Rose is trying to cheer up the Doctor and get him to setup house with her. She really is desperate, isn’t she?

    Finally, the Doctor has a “could a I hug you?” moment with one of the humans that’s just really stupid.

    Now that the beast has awoken, I can hardly wait for next week for the Doctor to defeat him. Or perhaps he won’t…?

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  • Family Update

    James got out of the hospital Thursday and has been recovering well. It’s been a terribly stressful week.

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  • Macbook Initial Reactions

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    Well, since I’m sitting here waiting for more “Blueberry Repeat” and wide awake I might as well clear up a few details about my Macbook.

    As reported earlier, I was waiting for my glacial “expedited” delivery and none too happy about the pace. Despite what the delivery projection stated, the Macbook arrived on the 30th at about 9:00AM. I was almost too sick to answer the door, and if Michelle hadn’t alerted me, I wouldn’t have even heard them.

    As it was, I hauled it into my office and left it there. It was over an hour before I had the energy to take it out of the box (and dutifully photograph the process.) Even then, the best I could manage was to boot it, hook it to the iBook and start the transfer.

    Point one: I’ve never done a complete Mac to Mac firewire transfer before. It worked really well. The most I’ve done in the past is to just transfer user accounts and network settings and such. This technique certainly makes it simple to upgrade from one Mac to the next. When completed, this Macbook was virtually identical to my iBook.

    Apart from booting and verifying that it connected to my network, I did nothing else with the computer. I must say, in terms of speed, it seemed like a real dog. Later that same day, my 2GB memory upgrade from Mac Ram Direct arrived. Late in the evening, I made a half-hearted attempt to install the memory, but, despite the new, easy to upgrade Macbook I couldn’t find a single philips-head screwdriver small enough to open the easy-access panel.

    I figured if I couldn’t go visit my son in the hospital, I wasn’t going to go to the hardware store and buy a screwdriver. (I couldn’t have driven a car if I’d wanted to, anyway.)

    Wednesday morning was quite different. I felt almost alive, and more importantly, hungry. We’d exhausted most of the food in the house over the weekend and never got to go shopping due to the medical emergency, so I foraged out for food… and a screwdriver.

    Both accomplished, I came home to wait news about my boy, see if my breakfast “stayed put” and upgrade the memory. My boy is getting better, breakfast stayed down and the memory upgrade is a snap – although you do have to push the memory in quite hard before it properly snaps into place.

    Point two: 512mb isn’t enough. This should come as no surprise to anybody. Once the upgrade was in place, this machine flies!

    Point three: I saved enough money by not buying a black Macbook that I paid for more than half a third-party memory upgrade to 2GB.

    Point four: Intel Macs are a bit disappointing. Yes. It’s fast, but, lots of my apps aren’t universal yet, and quite a few of them explode. I’ve had more app crashes today than I’ve had ever on my iBook. Yes, things will get better, but this might not present the best user experience to a new switcher.

    I’ve taken my Applications folder and used label colors to indicate which apps are PowerPc only, plus I’ve created a new folder where I’ve placed programs that just don’t play at all. I’m still searching for universal or intel versions of everything I’ve got. Some apps, like Ecto (which I’m using for blogging) work just fine under Rosetta and I notice no difference over my iBook, but I also detect no improvement, either.

    So, after one day’s use, here are my random observations:

    Hot! This will be great in Greenland, but not so good in Arizona in July. Luckily, I don’t actually put a laptop on my lap very often.

    Front Row. That’s kinda cool, but that remote is destined to be lost. I know there’s no room, but they really should have built a dock inside the case for it. It clips to the magnetic latches, but no matter how I move it, it slides over some of the screen. That’s also useless for taking it with you. I never take my camcorder remote with me for the same reason I’ll never take the Macbook remote with me, either.

    Built in iSight. Wonderful. What a great idea.

    Keyboard. I like it. It feels good to me, but I’ve noticed a little sore on my right index finger. I’m not sure if that’s from the new keyboard, or just a coincidence.

    Size: It’s a smidgen heavier than my iBook, but smaller in virtually every other respect. It feels lighter, even if it isn’t.

    Screen. Oooooo, pretty colors. And some glare, although it hasn’t bothered me yet. Nice resolution and widescreen format.

    Mooooo. Yes, it moos. My initial reaction was that, if I took the computer out into the desert, at night, far, far from the sounds of any human activity and I put my ear to the keyboard, I could just hear the cow inside. (I shall hence-force call the cow, “Intelly”.) That’s not quite correct, though. I do once in a while hear it over the background noise.

    “Right” clicking? Heck yes, you can finally Ctrl-click without the control key, but you have to enable to option in preferences. Holding two fingers on the trackpad and clicking does the trick.

    Trackpad: Wider and rougher than the iBook. So far, I think I like it better, although, maybe that’s why my index finger is developing a sore!

    BZFLAG: BZflag blows up. 🙁 The coolest game ever and I cannot run it. Come on guys! Somebody out there compile that thing for Intel!

    Eject key: Dedicated eject key for the optical drive, yeah!

    Battery life: Seems comparable to the iBook, but too early to tell.

    I’ll post more as it occurs to me…

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  • Long Night in the Lonely House

    James is getting progressively better, and should be home in a day or so. I, too, have also made a huge improvement and even ate solid food today. Michelle has still been good, but not quite so good as yesterday. I think she realized I’m feeling better and so decided to push her frontiers a bit more. Or perhaps it was something else…

    After successfully negotiating (and retaining) a solid brunch, I decided I’d best go visit James and Irene at the hospital. James still had that sick child look but he was obviously feeling much better. He is off oxygen and the IV. He’s keeping solid food down, and lots of it. He’s also none too happy about being locked up in a metal crib with monitors tied to him. That’s unpleasant for him (and I’m sure for Irene, too) but a good sign.

    I made an unfortunately lunch choice at the hospital and, combined with driving home in a very hot car, set me to a bit of relapse, but I recovered after rest and even had some dinner.

    Michelle wanted to go to bed, and, being no one else in the house, wanted to sleep in Irene’s an my room. I wasn’t ready for bed and stayed up, feeling somewhat ill at ease. Was something wrong?

    When I went to bed, I felt the same way. The house was empty and foreboding and I had a difficult time getting to sleep. I finally got to sleep around 11:30.

    I awoke at 12:10 to the sound of Michelle screaming. She was incoherent and couldn’t tell me what was wrong, but finally asked for water. When I handed her the glass she pushed it away and started to vomit. I just barely managed to get her to the bathroom before it all broke loose.

    She did her business, stood there and cried for a few minutes, then washed up, told me she was “OK” and crawled back into bed.

    Just after 1:00 the scene repeated itself. (I’ll spare you the photograph, but I can tell you that she had blueberries at dinner, and it’s not a pleasant sight.)

    She was fast asleep again before I finished cleaning up the horror that was the bathroom, and now I’m quite wide awake, waiting for the next scream.

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  • Lonely House

    lonelocust.com => So What About The Family?

    Back three weeks ago I mentioned that everybody except James and myself had gotten sick. Not so anymore.

    Sunday, James was coughing a bit, but by Sunday, he was throwing up and wouldn’t drink anything, so Irene finally had to take him to emergency. They admitted him immediately because he was having difficulty breathing, and that’s where he stays. He’s got a touch of pneumonia and has to stay there until he’s breathing normally through the night.

    Irene is staying with him. After the first night when I got home (someone has to look after Michelle) about 1:00AM I was hit by the same thing Irene had. A nasty stomach flu, with muscle cramps, fever, etc.

    All day yesterday, I could barely do more than move from one spot on the floor to another. Michelle was particularly good. She didn’t cause problems and she helped out. She’d get me things when I needed them and didn’t complain.

    Still, with only her and myself in the house, it was really lonely last night.

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  • No Framing, No Pasting

    Scientific American => The Flipping Point
    How the evidence for anthropogenic global warming has converged to cause this environmental skeptic to make a cognitive flip

    In order to link to this article, I believe I agreed to a copyright condition that I would make no comments on this, so I won’t.

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  • Grass Jelly Drink Tops 100!

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    Yeah! My grass Jelly Drink photo inched its way to 100 views on Flickr.

    Well, looking at the picture is infinitely better than drinking the darned stuff!


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  • Delivery Travesty

    Delivery Travesty

    I’m really not too happy about this.

    I ordered my Macbook last week and paid for 2-3 day expedited shipping (rather than 5-7, which usually equates to 7-8 days), and, remembering that it is TOMORROW in China, so it was really shipped on the 24th, this is ridiculous!

    It’s here in Phoenix, since last night, and they don’t plan to deliver until Wednesday?! Yes, today is a holiday, but that’s no excuse for it taking 7 days!!!


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  • Doctor Who – The Idiot’s Lantern – Review

    The Idiot’s Lantern
    by Mark Gatiss

    Mark Gatiss, who turned in one of the best episodes last season has delivered again.

    It’s 1953 London, on the eve of Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation, and an alien lifeform existing inside television plans to feed on the 20 million people anticipated to watch the coronation.

    The term “Idiot’s Lantern” is early television-era british slang, much as Boob Tube was in the US. While, as far as I could tell, the term was never used in the episode, it’s certainly appropriate. The coronation was the first great push for the invasion of televisions into British homes.

    Gatiss has really turned in a solid story, with pacing that perfectly fits the 42 minute episode. Pointless characterization is kept to a minimum and the scenes move the plot along rather than drive the often misguided attempts at moving the good Doctor from melodrama to drama.

    Rose is not so annoying in this episode and actually does a good turn as a detective, before being eaten by the TV monster.

    The conclusion takes place atop a transmitter tower and doesn’t half conjure up recollections of Logopolis. In fact, according to the Doctor Who Confidential on the making of this episode, one of the lines of dialogue that got cut involved the Doctor’s hesitation about climbing another transmitter tower. It’s a great shame the line was cut, because the second I saw that the Doctor had to climb the tower, my first words were, “Remember Logopolis, Doctor!” Some mention of it really belonged in the final version.

    No, I don’t talk to characters on TV too often, but it says a lot of Mark Gatiss’ skill in that he’s written an episode that draws you in completely.

    My only reservation about the episode is that, while I suppose I can buy the premise that an electrical creature feeds on the neural activity of the human brain and can, essentially, wipe it clean, I can’t quite accept that it also wipes their face free of features (like noses, mouths, eyes and such.) I’m certain that was just a concession to “shock” when the first victim is revealed on screen.

    Despite the fact that I like Gatiss’ work, I really wasn’t expecting too much from this episode, but instead, it’s my favorite so far this season.

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  • Blue Clouds at Night, NASA’s Delight?

    New Scientist Space =>Mysterious glowing clouds targeted by NASA

    Glowing, silvery blue clouds that have been spreading around the world and brightening mysteriously in recent years will soon be studied in unprecedented detail by a NASA spacecraft.

    The Aeronomy of Ice in the Mesosphere (AIM) mission will be the first satellite dedicated to studying this enigmatic phenomenon. Due to launch in late 2006, it should reveal whether the clouds are caused by global warming, as many scientists believe.

    A similar phenomena can make weather balloons look like convincing UFOs just before sunrise or after sunset.

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