Archive for August, 2009

The latest expansion to the award-winning Serenity role-playing game is coming soon.

For fans of Joss Whedon’s Serenity, the long-awaited Big Damn Heroes Handbook sourcebook, by Cam Banks, will be released this fall. (We’ll post an exact release date soon!) Everything a big damn hero needs to be a big damn hero, including stats for both minor and major nefarious villains, is in this book, along with rules for spaceship-to-spaceship combat, descriptions of Chinese communities, and new ideas for running Assets and Complications. (And, of course, more ways for your big damn hero to cuss in Chinese!)

TFAW says it's coming October 28, Amazon thinks it'll be out December 31. But all of Margaret Weis Productions' materials have been well done with plenty of info presented in a very stylistic manner, and I've no doubt this will be a worthy addition to your fantasizin'. Eitehr way, order early for a better price.

NaNoWriMo 2009 badges are out!

OK, yes, granted it's still a few months till November when National Novel Writing Month attacks, but they couldn't wait and frankly I can use the nudging to get ready. I started strong in my first NaNoWriMos but my performance the last few years has been sad.

Getting psyched already…

New from AbbyShot Clothiers, makers of the Browncoat, officially licensed Doctor Who wear: the Tenth Doctor's coat, and a Martha Jones Jacket!

Based on David Tennant’s costume, this designer-quality coat is bound to be your favorite everyday garment! This replica trenchcoat, officially licensed by the BBC, features high-quality wool blend fabric, full lining (color matched to the costume coat), double-breasted buttoning, detailed stitching on the back, and outside welt pockets with flaps.

Available in Men’s sizes SM-XL, this coat will make the centerpiece of any Doctor Who fan’s collection. Feel like the last of the Time Lords!

Slip into her sporty leather jacket, based on the Doctor’s companion from the ever-popular Series 3, as played by Freema Agyeman!

This replica garment, officially licensed by the BBC, features: 100% leather, full lining, two-way zipper and detailed stitching. Available in Ladies’ Sizes: S-XXL, this jacket will make a great addition to any Doctor Who fan’s collection!

Pre-order from TFAW and save 20% on the price, and if that's not logical I dunno what is.

The hot new music video from The Guild, written by net-heartthrob Felicia Day and Jed Whedon and performed by Day and the rest of the Guild cast members (with Maurissa Tancharoen dancing and singing backup vocals, I believe), hit the web today and immediately leveled up to #1 in the iTunes Music Videos and held firm. And good, because it's a great pop song in its own right that becomes more addictive the more you listen to it.

Besides, how cool is it that a largely home-made music video by a group of talented geeks pushed Taylor Swift to #2?

Watch it for free above, check out the lyrics here, buy the video at iTunes and get the MP3 from Amazon And get ready for season three of The Guild to start August 25th on Xbox Live and September 1rst on MSN/ZUNE.

Well, it is a review, but mostly it was a contest entry for McSweeney's recent columnist contest. I didn't win so you get it as a blog entry. Here's what I submitted:

Life Lessons, by C. A. Bridges

My columns, should you choose to accept them, would be a variety of subjects with the common thread being the real life lessons I take away. Example:

Review: “The Graveyard Book,” by Neil Gaiman

Ordinarily one might think I have no reason to read a children’s book, as I am no longer a child and frankly wasn’t much of one to begin with. But there are lessons to be learned from all books great and small, and I loathe missing the chance for enrichment in any form.

This particular form is currently garnering all the praise it can get. Hordes of critics, writers’ organizations and librarians, working in shifts, have been feverishly devising new awards to quickly bestow upon this lively (ha!) tale of a small, recently orphaned boy raised by ghosts in a graveyard. Morbid as the subject may be, the lessons the boy garners are valuable ones indeed. Lessons of bravery, common sense and deduction, stories of responsibility and valor. Lessons valuable enough, in fact, that even after only a few short chapters I judged them worthy enough to be passed to all children.

I started small, with a nephew.

Jimbo, as he was unfortunately known, was a particularly sticky and noisome boy, with an equally annoying family (sorry, sis). My intended program of involuntary personal growth could only benefit him. But I decided, upon reflection, that it would be unnecessarily cruel to actually murder his parents, as well as being too much work. Instead I offered to feed and water him for a weekend so that his newly emancipated mother and father might enjoy the bliss of a quiet house, and then, once he was in my clutches, I merely informed him that he was now an orphan.

I had been concerned that the lack of physical violence in his presence might fail to suitably traumatize him for my purposes but as it turned out, detailed, step-by-step description of his parents’ fictional, horrendous demise was quite enough, especially when I added the appropriate gestures and sound effects. This was an excellent sign! A traumatized child is a child ready to learn. It was off to the graveyard!
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Season two of Dollhouse begins September 25 on FOX, and to get ready for it WatchDollhouseWeek.com is gearing up for another communal watching of the first season.

Beginning on August 14, join fans around the world in watching two episodes of Dollhouse back-to-back every Friday, a six-week communal re-watch of Season One in its entirety.

If you tweet about it while you watch (and you really should) add #dollhouse so others can follow along. Live international commentary, anyone?

The program schedule is up at watchdollhouseweek.com and it's set so that you'll finish the unaired 13th episode "Epitaph One" just before the premiere of season two.

Check watchdollhouseweek.com for more details.

Tell QMx what Serenity means to you – in words, verse, artwork, whatever – and you may win nifty prizes up to an Inara's Shuttle diorama.

The shuttle diorama features one of the 2.5-inch, hand-painted Serenity shuttles from the Big Damn Replica, hovering over it’s own little landing platform with the words “Serenity” and “Inara’s Shuttle” laser cut into its surface. Only 10 of these have been made and one of them already went to Jane Espenson (which only seems fitting as the shuttle diorama was originally her idea.)

Or you can follow QMx on Twitter; they'll be pulling a random follower to win another shuttle diorama. Or you can impress them with how well you encouraged other people to follow them and win another diorama.

Entries should be sent to admin@fireflyshipworks.com by Sept. 15, 2009, winners will be announced Oct. 15. Click here for more details.

So after a solid day and a half of consistent and aggravating abdominal pain I started getting fevers, and that's never a good combination. Up till that point I was assuming constipation and all the laugh-a-minute joy that comes with that, but a fever meant something was blocked or something was septic or something was about to blow up, and I didn't see Ex-Lax or Pepto helping that, much.

My fevers were around 100.7 – just enough to worry, not enough for an obvious ER visit – and we weren't positive that it would be considered an emergency and therefore covered by my insurance, so we went to an urgent care place first to let them make the call. Doctor there took my money and said get to the ER and let them make sure my appendix wasn't about to blow, and hie us hence we did.

At the ER we got in fairly quickly (i.e. under an hour) and the nurses were great. The admitting nurse told us to call the next nurse we'd see "Candy," because they had all decided upon their "hooker names" today (the admitting nurse was "Bambi," we found out later). After I was shown to a room and given a robe "Candy" came in, set some IV stuff down, and said this was going to hurt a bit. "Ah, you're that kind of hooker," I said. She laughed, and Teres and I both agreed that hookers with needles were a bad combination.

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New at the Prop Store of London, the Operative's outfit.

A costume worn by The Operative in the sci-fi adventure Serenity. This excellent costume was worn by The Operative (Chiwetel Ejiofor) in scenes near the end of the film on Mr Universe’s planet where he tries to stop Mal broadcasting the message. It consists of a pair of black trousers, a black top, chest armour which is made from rubber sprayed a dark bronze colour, a thick leather belt and gauntlets, which are also the same colour as the chest armour, a pair of black boots (size 9) and a leather sheath that is strapped on to his back and has the handle of his sword sticking out of the top. The sword handle has been glued into the sheath and so can’t be removed, it is made from hard rubber and some of the silver paint has flaked off in places.

I'm almost certain I've listed this before, but this set is listed as having been worn by the actor onscreen, which makes this a bigger deal. Buy it and use it to freak out Nathan Fillion at the next con!

Remember in Serenity when it spiralled down through the massive air battle, whoosh! and dodged all the other ships, zing bwow! and then got hit with the EMT thingies zap! and Wash barely managed to control it well enough to slide it into a big hanger where it got all bashed up, smash crunch!?

This is one of the things in the hanger that it hit.

This is a hanger vehicle miniature model from the 2005 sci-fi adventure movie Serenity. When the crew is being chased by Reavers they must crash land or “glide” the ship into the hanger after they were hit by enemy fire. The Firefly ship lands in the hanger knocking out scaffolding and comes to a screeching halt next to this all terrain vehicle. The miniature is 9” long made of plastic model with 5 wheels and bound together with screws. This miniature vehicle is in good condition.