K-Squared Ramblings

Conan the (Musical) Librarian

I’ve been meaning to pick up a copy of the Conan the Barbarian soundtrack for a while, but kept not finding it. A few weeks ago, we were listening to a copy of Holst’s The Planets we had just picked up. I’d heard the whole suite before, but had only heard “Mars” recently, so one section of “Jupiter” just leaped out at me. I was absolutely certain I had heard something very like it, but not exactly the same, in a movie, probably sword-and-sorcery. I tried several net searches, but had no luck - it’s not as if you can plug a few notes into Google and search for pieces containing a melody.

A while later it occurred to me that it might have been from Conan, so I tried to find it online, only to learn it was out of print. This looks like a job for eBay! It took a couple of auctions to get it (I really hate snipers), but I did, and the CD showed up in the mail a few days ago.

And sure enough, the piece I couldn’t help but think of while listening to “Jupiter” was there: track 12, “The Kitchen/The Orgy.” Interestingly the liner notes go into how Basil Poledouris constructed the piece, but don’t make a single mention of Holst, despite other tracks acknowledging influences such as Orff’s Carmina Burana, or the Gregorian chant “Dies Irae.” But the similarity is undeniable - even more similar than “Charging Fort Wagner” from James Horner’s Glory soundtrack or Joel McNeely’s battle music from the Verdun 1916 episode of the Young Indiana Jones Chronicles is to Orff’s “O Fortuna” (neither of which credits that influence either).

Random Rent

Got someone’s virus-generated email today (though that’s far from unusual). The mail server strips out known viruses and obvious subterfuge, but this one still had a huge HTML file attached… containing, oddly enough, the complete lyrics to Rent. (Incidentally, some idiot decided to make the entire official website appear in a popup. If you have popups disabled, all you see is a message telling you to install Flash, even if you already have it.)

Reindeer on the Radar

Drivng to work this morning, we passed a Halloween display (the same people also do huge Christmas and Easter displays) that had recently added some Halloween-themed yellow caution tape. (Something like “Caution: Enter if you dare!”) Now I’ve only been out of bed for about a half hour at this point, and I was up way too late last night, and my mind starts making strange connections, and comes up with the following exchange between a child and parent:

(little kid voice): “If Iraq is in a no-fly zone, how does Santa get there?”

(parent): “Most people in Iraq don’t believe in Christmas, honey.”

Okay, so far this is just logical - as far as I know, Islam doesn’t notice Christmas any more than Christianity notices Ramadan. At this point Katie says it’s a better answer than “No-fly zones don’t apply to reindeer,” and I’m reminded of the anti-aircraft guns targeting Jack’s sleigh in The Nightmare Before Christmas. Then my mind takes it a step further:

“But what about the ones that do?”

“Santa has to Fed-Ex them their presents.”

Hey, it made sense at the time.

Yeah, it’s sorta like that.

Kelly: “I’m about to blow up my desk right now.”

Me: “Yeah, but do you want to be sitting at it at the time?”

Work sucks, but the quotes are good.

Birds of Prey at 3 episodes

When I heard they were turning Birds of Prey into a TV series, I wasn’t sure what to think, having never picked up the comic book (although I do follow various comics news sites). Having seen 3 episodes, I’m still not sure. The premiere episode was pretty good, for a pilot. In fact, most of the things I disliked about it were, as another review termed it, “pilot-itis” - excessive exposition, cast not quite settled in, etc.
Read the rest of this entry »

“The House Always Wins,” except when Angel does.

Yay me. Looks like the writing-stuff-down-so-I-can-prove-I-said-it purpose of this board is coming into play sooner and more effectively than I’d thought. Not that I like the way the writers brought it about, but I’m beginning to think that to write on one of Joss’s shows, you have to take an Emotional (Manipulation) Intelligence Test. Saying any more in this vein would constitute spoilage, so I’ll just insert my little tag…. Read the rest of this entry »

It’s just like homework, only cooler.

I seem to be having a great deal of trouble with my Buffy. Perhaps it’s due to the fact that my life from 8:15 to 5ish every day is nothing but a collection of deadlines, making them the last thing I want to face when I’ve just vegged out for an hour having my emotions…..manipulated. Perhaps it’s just that I feel obligated to come up with some deep insight rather than just saying “It was cool” (something that gets me finger-tied when reviewing fic as well). Whatever the reason, it’s getting quite annoying to me, and I hope those of you waiting for stuff aren’t too annoyed with me. What I think should work is combining this week and next week for each series, since neither one was particularly brain-grabby for me this week. Except that making the Home Improvement big brother evil was freaky, we think he’s going to become a demon now, and I want to see Gwen (the Gambit in Rogue’s clothing) again.

Feel free to ramble at me. I’ll be grateful.

LOTR DVD Comparison

Just saw this page that compares the different DVDs of Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. I’ve been looking forward to the Special Edition mainly for the new cut of the film which adds back a number of scenes and details from the book which I had wanted to see.

And no, I don’t see this as some cheesy marketing ploy to get me to buy it twice. Each package has a separate version of the movie, and none of the extras are duplicated between the two sets. I heard someone describe it as a 6-DVD set split across two packages, and that sounds about right.

Curse you, bash.org!

…in jest, anyway. A month or two ago I stumbled across the QDB, a massive database of amusing (and sometimes not-so-amusing) user-submitted quotes, primarily from IRC chats. Last night I went back, curious to see if anything new had cracked the top 50. Well, the top ones were mostly the same, but I kept pulling up random lists, and was up until about 1:15.

Time to sleep. No, time to work. Damn.

“Same Time, Same Place,” just a little twisted.

It occurred to me partway through the final segment of this week’s Buffy that perhaps, for a watchers’ council planning to have dinner during the first segment of the episode, linguini hadn’t been the best menu choice.

Eeeyugh.

Read the rest of this entry »

Cautious Optimism

Noticed a couple of articles that are cause for at least some optimism. Representatives Rick Boucher and John Doolittle have introduced a bill to remove restrictions on fair use from the DMCA, and the US Copyright Office is seeking public comments on the same issue.

It’s just ridiculous for e-books to have restrictions that make it illegal to read them out loud or lend them to friends, or for music to be set up so that you can’t even move it to another room of the house. And if it’s illegal to write or use a program that lets you transfer your music from your old computer to your new one, what are you supposed to do?

American Depression

I read this morning that Congress has voted to let President Bush attack Iraq. I’d love to be proven wrong, but I suspect that even if we win, and win quickly, it will likely accomplish only two things: cement other countries’ view of us as a bully (the satirists at The Onion have a great article on that subject), and ensure that new middle-east-based terrorists will be gunning for us for a really long time.

Maybe I’m cynical, but I just haven’t seen much to be optimistic about lately.

You might want to re-think that slogan

Saw the nearby KFC has a poster advertising a “Hot & Fresh Breast Meal.”

The last time I saw something using the words “hot,” “fresh,” and “breast” in such close proximity, it had a spam score of about 20.

“Deep Down” we’re all a little freaked.

Don’t you just love having your head messed with? And isn’t Joss great at it? Of course, if you’re a return viewer, you know this by now and it’s probably part of the reason you tune in. The season premiere, though, didn’t have a lot of time or latitude to do much but mess with our heads, since it had so many loose ends to tie up. Not a whole lot of hints about the rest of the season, so far as I could see, but still good. What we’ve got here is a bunch of people who are doing things, but generally either being very cagey about their motives or not giving a clue as to whether they have any. In a writing class, this would be unforgivable. On TV, it’s suspense. Read the rest of this entry »

The Turn Signal Is Your Friend

Given that most of us think we are above-average drivers, you’d think people wouldn’t expect other drivers to be telepathic.

Turn signals prevent other drivers from hitting you! (Or at least reduce the chances of it.)

I am amazed time and time again as I see people driving shiny new Mercedes, Lexuses (Lexi?), and BMWs dodging in and out of traffic without signalling, trusting those below-average other drivers to have above-average reflexes and precognitive abilities.

Bringer of Doom!

Mwa ha ha! Guilty as charged.

Beware the summer cold, my dear,
The nose that blows, the throat that hacks!
Beware the Sudafed, and fear
The Kleenex pocket packs!

….And now for some lemon tea. *snif*

What Lies “Beneath You”

In case you’re wondering, yes, I am planning to make this a weekly column of sorts. And it’s been brought to my attention that maybe I should mark it as containing spoilers, seeing as how some people in some other places might not have seen the episode in question yet, or might have missed it. I understand this. Spoiler warnings will now be conveniently placed before the text of my rambling. Voilá.

I’m beginning to see a pattern here with the chased young things beginning episodes. And I and many others think they’re supposed to be potential Slayers–”Lola” here was a pretty good fighter, the other was in extremely good shape, and Lola actually managed to communicate something, dreamstyle. My first guess as to what was sufficiently beneath and devouring to fit the description was, simply, the Hellmouth. Read the rest of this entry »