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Posts Tagged ‘entertainment’

Remember when I did “Ask Matt” back in October?

Well, it was such a rousing success that I thought I’d try it again.

So go ahead, and ask away. Any question, any question at all. It could be trivial and easy, or it could be metaphysical and difficult.

Here are some topics/questions to avoid of if you expect a good answer:

• My Little Pony
• Politics
• Sentences that end in question marks
• Advice for people 25 and younger
• Questions that are asked in English (or any non-English language)
• Steers
• “Does rockets really work?”
• Advice for people over 25

If you stay clear of those topics, I promise you that I will give you a well-researched, thought provoking answer.

Spoilers: beware.

I’m calling it right now: this is the best episode of Lost to date.

Around the office, we call revealing moments in Lost, “nuggets”. In this episode, “The Constant”, Lost didn’t deliver nuggets. It delivered a massive golden payload of goodness.

Episodes featuring Desmond to date have been among the best episodes, almost without exception. So when it was revealed early that this was to be a “Desmond episode”, I cheered.

The only thing, and it’s a minor, minor thing, that bothered me was all the sciency talk about frequencies and radiation and what not, but then talking about the unsciency idea of “a constant” that somehow anchors one’s time/space traveling. Maybe that makes me a fool who is enslaved to time and space. I dunno.

Speedlinking is yet another tool of the lazy blogger. Basically I smash together a bunch of interesting links that I collect every so often, and write a sentence or two about them.

This week’s Speedlinking is being brought to you courtesy of the useful Instapaper website, which I’ve been using to temporarily bookmark the below links.

• The secret to life, the universe, and everything is…not 42. It’s 10¹²², or 10000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 00000000000000000000000000000.
• “During the space race, NASA spent millions to develop a pen that would write in space, whereas the Soviet cosmonauts used a pencil.” Well, it turns out that’s not really the case. So stop telling that story and acting clever.
• Which makes more sense incrementally, investing or paying down principle on your mortgage?
• There are over a half-a-dozen different models of time travel in fiction. My favorite is the time loop, as seen in Groundhog Day and…maybe…Lost.

Here is an update on the Game King-II.

Thanks to many loyal mgroves.com readers, there’s a lot of new information for this enigmatic device.

First, I’d like to list all the previous Game King-II posts, in order of oldest to newest:

• PMP Game King II
• Game King-II: First thoughts
• Game King-II: A full review
• Game King-II: Emulation
• Game King-II battery mod

So, if you haven’t read all of those, go back and review them. Your question might have already been answered! Also, check out the Game King-II Wikipedia page and also the Game King-II Wikispaces page (created by TKF15H, one of the very helpful mgroves.com readers).

Note that most of this information comes from commenters on this site.

• The Game King-II does not work with a Mac. To get around this, you can
  use an SD Card and then copy data from the SD Card to the internal storage.
• If you have lost or didn’t get the disc that came with the Game King-II, you can
  download the movie converter software here. Please note that while
  I have been using this program for some time now that I do not promise that the
  software will work and I do not promise that it won’t turn your computer into a
  smoldering heap. You have been warned.
• Someone posted an “unboxing” video of the Game King-II on YouTube.
  It’s very entertaining and informative. Thank you kinglager, whoever you are.
• There are at least two models of this specific Game King-II: the black and the white one. SkyFire2001
  somehow managed to find the manufacturer: Fujiyama.
  Bizarrely enough (is anything not bizarre with the Game King-II), there’s a whole different fake screenshot
  in their stock photo, and it’s the black model.
• There’s a whole website dedicated to “MP4″ players: MyMxPlayer.org.
• Besides posting the above link, MNintGamer posted a list of SNES ROMs that (according to him) play okay
  on the Game King-II. For the full list, check out his comment.
• jnjy posted some great pictures of the insides of the Game King-II.
  His pictures were the impetus for me to do the battery mod.
• According to DJ, a 4-gig SD card will work (albeit a bit slow).
• NGF makes an exciting claim that the Game King-II can connect to your TV. Basically,
  he claims that you just stick a standard Y-adapter (picture below) into the headphone jack of the Game King.
  Then, just use RCA cables to connect “red” on the Y-adapter to “yellow” on the TV and “white” on the Y-adapter
  to “white” on your TV. I haven’t tried this yet, so do so at your own risk.

• There are all kinds of sound bugs with the emulator. For instance, to get sound to work on a GBC game,
  open an NES game, increase the volume, then load the GBC game (TKF15H).
• Some Game Kings apparently have some games that ship with them. I wasn’t able to play these
  games for some reason, but Luke was kind enough to post some of
  these “32-bit Sunmedia” games if you want to give it a try.
• To access the firmware, plug the USB cord into the Game King while it is off. Hold
  down “esc” while turning on the device. Now you should have access to the firmware. If you are going to
  do this and mess with the firmware, MAKE A BACKUP. Also, if you have a version other than “SDK-1.56″, there
  are a lot of interested people who would like a copy of your firmware. You can upload it here
  or email it to me at webmaster@mgroves.com.
• TKF15H wrote a program that allows you to change the start-up screen on your Game King
  once you have access to the firmware. The speed at which he wrote it worries me, and I think maybe he needs
  to get out more. (Just kidding, dude!) You can get his C++ source
  code for the program at the Wikispace he created.

Phew! I think that’s everything. Feel free to add omissions or new information to the comments below.
As you can see, there’s a scrappy, but thriving community of Game King-II enthusiasts. Maybe it’s time for you
to join our ranks!

This is a sketch from Kids in the Hall, episode 10 of season 1.

Mark: Hey, see that moon? No, that one there.

Dave and Bruce: Ahh.

Mark: I think that moon is a bit of a spy. Yes I do.

Mark: There was a moon like that on the summer of my sixteenth year. Some say
I was sixteen but, heh, I don’t know. And there was a girl, too; her name was Marie. At night
together, we would walk down by the sea, and, oh my God, if you could’ve seen the body on this woman! The
way at night her long legs would stick into the moist night sand like God’s own barge poles! You
know? And I longed to tell her the feeling I had in my, heart for her, but the words would not
come; they would not come through my spotty adolescent face; they would not come through my
angry hair or my sweaty feet or any other part on this body that I now call a man! So the words
je t’aime were never passed between us. But, that moon, yeah that one there, it spied
on us then, as I think maybe it spies on us tonight, no?

Bruce: The moon is bright, over Lebanon tonight! The Lebanese moon looks down.
Shim! Sham! Shikam! Cattle explodes! Cow shrapnel drips off a tree, cascades into mother’s tear, for
little boy. Who goes on into battle and comes back dead or worse, comes back a man. Why don’t you
warn them moon? Why don’t you say “duck” or “scram?” But the moon will not. The moon just sits there
grinning, like a corpse at a Dean Martin roast. What are you laughing at moon? Why don’t you share
it with the whole class moon?

The moon laughs knowingly.

The moon laughs.

The moon.

The.

Dave: Gee, I wonder who owns that moon?

Mark and Bruce: Yes…yes…yes…yes!

Recently, Zogby and the Norman Lear center did a survey to find out the entertainment tastes of conservatives and liberals.

First off, note that Norman Lear is an outspoken liberal and friend of Meathead, but also that Zogby is a credible source of statistics and polling.

Let’s go over the concept of correlation and average, briefly. As you should know, correlation is not causation, it’s simply the statistical strength of a relationship. So for instance, just because 85% of people who drink beer are healthy, doesn’t mean beer makes you healthy. It could mean that being healthy makes you drink beer, or that some other factor external to the data causes both.

The data for the survey is attached. The sample sizes were statistically pretty good (n around 1000 for each political grouping). However, there are no confidence intervals or anything like that (I’m sure they were calculated, but they aren’t in the data), so there’s no way of knowing how accurate these point estimates are.

With that quick preface, here are some interesting points from the survey:

• Dr. Gregory House apparently unifies us all with his cynical cruelty. Conservatives and liberals all enjoy his show.
• Of all the movies surveyed about, The Departed was the only apolitical/irreligious movie that was preferred by one group (liberals) — I guess because it’s R-rated? C’mon adult conservatives, this is a good movie!
• Conservatives don’t seem to play a lot of video games, what with being employed and all.
• Out of 15 TV and film genres, “arts” emerged as the one with the highest positive correlation to liberal viewers, “arts” being a codeword for “gay”.

(Those last two are jokes, people, jokes!)

And here are some interesting things that weren’t talked about in the article, but were hiding in the data:

• People polled were all likely voters. So there are hardly any non-voters. I think this is a potential bias, as a non-voter isn’t necessarily apolitical in their opinions.
• Liberals surveyed believed that government generally solved problems (69.7%). I’m going to assume they think that liberal government generally solved problems, not government in general. Whereas conservatives (89.5%) think that government doesn’t solve problems (it doesn’t matter WHO is in there). This is strange given that the data also suggests that 80% or more of all surveyed (including liberals) were cynical about the motives of elected officials. So what’s up liberals, something doesn’t jive here.
• Nader got most of his survey votes from so-called “moderates”. Interesting.
• Liberals were observant enough to say they lived on “planet Earth” but were unable to specify any further.
• The “global economy” issue was close to split 50/50 among liberals. I’m guessing 50% are in “dey took our jerbs” camp, and 50% are in the “every other country is superior” camp?

Today is the official release date of Bender’s Big Score, in case you haven’t been paying attention for the last 10 weeks.

Go get the DVD! Support the arts! Specifically, support the arts that I like!

• Can’t Get Enough Futurama has a bunch of news links about the release, including some Wired articles and video interviews.
• Here’s an unboxing video of Bender’s Big Score with a fun-KAY soundtrack.

• Now would be a great time to review the complete Best of Futurama series here at mgroves.com, since it’s now complete.
• Check out the official Bender’s Big Score site (ilovebender.com) and get yourself a nice Futurama desktop wallpaper.

MST3K is a great show, but there’s one thing it also is: long.

Luckily for you, the not-quite-there MST3K fan, there are a lot of “shorts” from MST3K episodes.

These are quick films shown right before the movie. They are usually very short, 11-15 minutes or so. The shorts are educational film strips meant for schools or colleges, or even entertainment features meant for theaters. Many of these are the famous 50′s shorts with disembodied, authoritative voices telling you how to groom yourself or why you should be in industrial arts or join the band or something.

cog_nate at MetaFilter has put together a list of all the shorts as well as links to watch them on YouTube or Google Video or whatever. Go watch a few and bookmark that page.

Here’s an example of a fan-favorite short called Mr. B Natural (the most natural B you’ll ever see). It’s a film about how if you feel like a loser, just join the band! Oh yeah, and buy your instrument from Conn Musical Instruments, and you’ll become a happy king?

The white race will salute you as you prance and gad about!

It’s poetry appreciation day here at mgroves.com.

Enjoy one of my favorite poems, “A Psalm of Life” by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow–in audio or textual form.

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The following is an excerpt from Speaker for the Dead, the follow-up book to Ender’s Game, by Orson Scott Card.

It is a fictional letter from a Catholic Saint, set sometime around 1000-2000 years in the future.

A great rabbi stands teaching in the marketplace. It happens that a husband finds proof that morning of his wife’s adultery, and a mob carries her to the marketplace to stone her to death. (There is a familiar version of this story, but a friend of mine, a Speaker for the Dead, has told me of two other rabbis that faced the same situation. Those are the ones I’m going to tell you.)

The rabbi walks forward and stands beside the woman. Out of respect for him the mob forbears, and waits with the stones heavy in their hands, “Is there anyone here,” he says to them, “who has not desired another man’s wife, another woman’s husband?”

They murmur and say, “We all know the desire. But, Rabbi, none of us has acted on it.”

The rabbi says, “Then kneel down and give thanks that God made you strong.” He takes the woman by the hand and leads her out of the market. Just before he lets her go, he whispers to her, “Tell the lord magistrate who saved his mistress. Then he’ll know I am his loyal servant.”

So the woman lives, because the community is too corrupt to protect itself from disorder.

Another rabbi, another city, He goes to her and stops the mob, as in the other story, and says, “Which of you is without sin? Let him cast the first stone.”

The people are abashed, and they forget their unity of purpose in the memory of their own individual sins. Someday, they think, I may be like this woman, and I’ll hope for forgiveness and another chance. I should treat her the way I wish to be treated.

As they open their hands and let the stones fall to the ground, the rabbi picks up one of the fallen stones, lifts it high over the woman’s head, and throws it straight down with all his might. It crushes her skull and dashes her brains onto the cobblestones.

“Nor am I without sin,” he says to the people. “But if we allow only perfect people to enforce the law, the law will soon be dead, and our city with it.”

So the woman died because her community was too rigid to endure her deviance.

The famous version of this story is noteworthy because it is so startlingly rare in our experience. Most communities lurch between decay and rigor mortis, and when they veer too far, they die. Only one rabbi dared to expect of us such a perfect balance that we could preserve the law and still forgive the deviation. So, of course, we killed him.

– San Angelo, Letters to on Incipient Heretic, trans. Amai a Tudomundo Para Que Deus Vos Ame Crist o, 103:72:54:2