K-Squared Ramblings

Nice Try

I’m sorry, no matter how many vitamins and minerals you add to cola, it’s not going to be healthy.

Oh, crap. Suddenly, I can picture the coffee chains and smoothie chains getting together.

“One iced blended mocha, please.”

“Would you like a free boost in that?”

Flash Smash Crash!

Hmm, I wonder how many newsstands displayed these books next to each other:

An explanation: I recently stumbled across a mention of Smash Comics, a series from Quality Comics that ran more or less concurrently with the more familiar Flash Comics. Just for kicks, I searched the Grand Comics Database (which is where I got the cover images) for Crash Comics, and found Crash Comics Adventures, which ran for 5 issues in 1940 before spinning off a series on the original Cat-Man. So the three books would have been on sale at the same time!

I couldn’t find any other books with the same pattern in the title. The GCD does substring matches, and “ash comics” only brought up variations on these three series. Though it did remind me that DC resurrected the Smash Comics title for one chapter of the 1999 The Justice Society Returns! event.

No comment?

Project Honeypot recently started tracking comment spammers as well as email harvesting bots. Oddly enough, even though they have data going back to March 22, and even though Bad Behavior and Spam Karma have blocked an incredible number of spam comments on this site (Bad Behavior has blocked 3807 connections in the past week alone)....none of the honeypots I manage have trapped a single comment spam.

And no, the honeypot on this site isn’t protected by those plugins.

Return of Babylon 5

The Babylon 5 Scripts mailing list just announced a July 31 release date for Babylon 5: The Lost Tales. JMS announced the project at last year’s San Diego Comic-Con: to revisit the universe for a series of direct-to-DVD movies. The first, Voices in the Dark, focuses on Sheridan, Lochley, and Galen, set during the 10th anniversary of the Interstellar Alliance.

One part of the story follows Sheridan as he picks up an unexpected visitor on the edge of Centauri space, Prince Regent Dius Vintari, and a warning about what will come afterward delivered by the techno-mage, Galen. The other part of the story is set aboard Babylon 5, as Colonel Lochley summons a priest from Earth space to deal with a problem that may have dark supernatural overtones. The two parts of the greater story intersect at certain key plot and thematic points, so that they overlap and complement each other while telling separate, but simultaneous, stories.

JMS has been posting photos and notes from the set from time to time, and (via ***Dave), TV Shows On DVD has posted a press release with more background and information about the DVD.

Interestingly, the press release and cover art make no mention of it being the first in a projected series. This is hardly a surprise, though, as Warner Bros. has always been reluctant to commit fully to Babylon 5 without testing the waters. Then they see the dollar signs and go all-out. It happened when they decided to release the pilot as a TV movie, instead of committing immediately to a series. It happened when they licensed the VHS rights to Columbia House, until they realized how much money Columbia House was making and launched their own series. It happened when they released just the pilot and one prequel as a DVD, before they were willing to release full season sets.

Hmm, perhaps the pre-order on Amazon shooting up to #10 in DVD sales before the end of the first day might help convince them? Edit: On day two, it’s up to #5. His people are coming.

Here’s hoping it’ll be worth the wait.

Firefox and IE Users: Time to Upgrade

Are you still using Firefox 1.5 or Internet Explorer 6? If so, it’s time to start seriously thinking about an upgrade.

Firefox 1.5 reached the end of its life today. That means that security and other fixes will only be available for Firefox 2 and later. Firefox 2 will run on all the same systems as the version you have right now, plus it gives you enhancements like spell check, phishing protection, and improvements to the features you already use.

Internet Explorer 6 is outmoded. It has limited support for the languages that make up the web (particularly CSS), and often disagrees with every other browser out there, forcing developers to write complicated code so that it will work on IE6. If you’re running Windows XP, you can upgrade to Internet Explorer 7. If you’re running an older version of Windows, you can benefit by switching to an alternative browser such as Firefox
or Opera. Whether you switch or upgrade, I highly recommend moving away from Internet Explorer 6.

Update: Mozilla has extended Firefox 1.5 support through mid-May.

Politicians in Washington

Yesterday, President Bush reportedly said, “Politicians in Washington shouldn’t be telling generals how to do their job.”

I guess he’d better recuse himself from any further military decisions for the rest of his term. Commander in Chief or not, the President of the United States is a politician in Washington.

Hmm, maybe he can give orders while traveling?

Crimson Rainbow

Friday was the first rain we’d seen in over a month. By evening, the trailing edge of the storm was starting to cross central Orange County, and I actually drove back into the cloud cover to pick Katie up from work. We ended up stopping for dinner, and got back on the road around sunset.

At sunset, there were clouds above us, rain in the east, and clear skies to the west, showing a bright orange sun. We looked to the east, and saw a huge rainbow. It was extremely high—it looked like it ought to be an entire circle, even though I knew it couldn’t be more than a semicircle. That doesn’t come through in the one photo that came out, since it’s a matter of perception: neither of us had ever seen a rainbow centered at the horizon before. It was also faint (I had to increase the contrast on this photo), and very red.

Google Images pulls up some nice pictures when you search for rainbow sunset. I particularly like this one at Flickr, which also shows spoke-like rays. Atmospheric Optics’ rainbow section is also worth a look, especially for some of the odd kinds of rainbows that aren’t often seen.

Spreading to the Converted

One of the problems with the ubiquitous Get Firefox! Get Opera! etc. web buttons is that while they might encourage someone unfamiliar with the product to check it out, they’re kind of pointless to someone who already uses your preferred browser. Sure, there’s a sense of, “Hey, this author uses Opera too!” but that’s about all it can do.

To make these a little more useful, on my Flash site, I use JavaScript to switch the button if someone’s using Firefox, and instead promote the Spread Firefox site. I’ve written up a similar method for Opera, though it’s less clear where to send people.

I recently discovered that Flock has taken another approach to solving this problem. As you may recall, Flock is a browser based on Firefox, focusing on social networking. It integrates with blogging sites, photo-sharing sites, bookmark-sharing sites and so on.

The Flockstars Extension expands on this by converting the button into a mini-profile. You fill in information like an avatar, usernames at Flickr, YouTube, etc., and links to your website(s). It generates button code that acts like an ordinary Flock button, but contains all this extra information.

The extension reads this information. Visitors to your site who are using Flock and the extension will see an icon in the toolbar, which will pop up a short profile and a menu of all the facets of your online presence.

It’s a cool idea, and seems to fit perfectly with Flock’s target audience. But it only solves half the problem. The browser promo badge is still there, still taking up space. The fact that the profile data is in the button code doesn’t make a difference; it might as well be stored in a set of META tags in the page head.

Blank.com

Spotted a “for sale” sign in front of an office building, with a tricky-to-type website. No, nothing has been blocked out:

So, how many spaces is it? Or is it a tab?

Lost on Avenue Q

So, did anyone else have the song “Mix Tape” pop into their heads in connection with tonight’s Lost?

Incidentally, on the question that so vexed Hurley and Charlie—namely, who would win in a race, the Flash or Superman… it’s the Flash. That’s not just a fan reaction, I have documented evidence.

Locke’s Office?

Here’s one for the Lost fans out there: a box company in Tustin, California!

Okay, actually, they’re a moving company, but check out this sign:

This is in a business/light industrial area on Walnut Ave.

Run Away!

Remember Clocky, the fiendish alarm clock that rolls away and hides when you hit snooze? The inventor has graduated from MIT and taken the design commercial. You can now buy your own self-propelled alarm clock.

(via Slashdot)

Flash: Greatest Stories and Off on a Tangent

DC Comics released their July solicitations today, along with some of the books due in August. They managed to say absolutely nothing informative (or, to be honest, particularly interesting) about Flash #14—just that it’s going to be big. C’mon, show, don’t tell!

On the plus side, we now have a cover and a confirmed date for Flash: The Greatest Stories Ever Told: August 15. The table of contents hasn’t changed from the initial announcement, so it sounds like it’s final. At least for promotion, they’re using Alex Ross’ portrait of the Flash.

Oddly enough, the one thing on the list that actually got me excited was the first collection of Tangent Comics, due August 29. (Edit: I’ve updated the image at the left to the final cover. Originally, DC posted the cover from Tangent Comics: The Atom)

Tangent Comics was a fifth-week* event back in 1997 that built an entirely new fictional universe using only the names from DC’s stable of characters. The Atom became a nuclear-powered Superman type. Green Lantern became a mysterious figure whose lantern could bring souls back from the dead to complete unfinished business. The Flash was a human made of light. The event consisted of nine books, each designed as if it were the first issue of an ongoing series, and was successful enough that they followed it up with a second round in 1998. Read the rest of this entry »

Maybe they cancel each other out

Found in a new area next to the foothills outside of Irvine that’s clearly being set up for a new housing development. I think the street was Portola Parkway, somewhere around Sand Canyon.

Dry spell

It’s been a dry year for California. Water districts all over the state are geared up for drought conditions. The hills in the Orange County area are still golden-brown in mid-April. Last year at this time, they had finally turned green for spring.

Here’s a shot from the Irvine Spectrum area from April 6, 2006:

That’s not a lawn behind that hedge, that’s a vacant lot. You can see it’s just as green as the strip of maintained grass along the sidewalk. Now here’s a picture taken about half a block away, taken last week, on April 6, 2007 (no, the timing was not intentional).

This year, only a few weeds and flowers have managed to take hold in the vacant lot. Meanwhile, the hills are their usual golden brown. Somehow, I don’t think we’re going to see much in the way of wildflowers this year. Read the rest of this entry »