inverted

okay...

if i was born with any innate traits or genetic gifts at birth, the one thing that i'd have to say--and would have to thank my mother for--is that i was born with good english. : )
as was my mom. just this natural ability to spell words, construct sentences and paragraphs, to know when something is grammatically correct. or, more likely, incorrect. i love to read. i love to write. i love how it's all put together.
however...
though i still have my dictionary right here next to my desk at all times, i have to admit that, should i find the need to actually look up a word or grab a synonym that is somehow escaping me, i'll just as soon throw it into google and go to either merriam-webster or thefreedictionary.com. it's faster and when i'm on a roll, in the passionate and/or frantic throes of writing, swiftness counts.
this is really a long build-up to explain how i sometimes stumble across things that are weird and i wonder, "how the hell did i find that?" i found this that way.

i was writing the text for the awesome cool perhapanauts/baltimore comiccon exclusive one-sheet (featuring the maryland goat man) and was pretty sure that there was a word--though i couldn't access it at the time--for the opposite of avert (or averted, as in, "he averted his eyes.") couldn't find it but was somehow linked to "inverted" and then to "inverted eyes" and there was a link for images of inverted eyes and look at this creepy stuff...

apparently, with the help of photoshop, "inverting" someone's face results in some of the most disturbing pictures you'd wanna see. really, they're just flipping the eyes and mouth of the unlucky subject and creating this unsettling look! yikes! these are the creatures from my nightmares, the demonic population of some of my most terrifying dreams! they look somewhat like the horrific entities that are stalking tim robbins in jacob's ladder, though there you only get glimpses of them. they look like twisted images from funhouse mirrors in hell.
no. you know what they look like...?
remember those bizarre, british, caricatures-come-to-life puppets that genesis used back in the 80s in the land of confusion video...?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oepXF2B5NK4

these things freak me out.










check out some more inverted celebs at

http://www.freakingnews.com/Inverted-Celebrities-Pictures---1754.asp


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

for those of you who are big fans of web comics,
here's a brand new offering from our friend,
denver brubaker--tales of a checkered man!

http://thecheckeredman.com/




check it out!
(get it...? "check"...)


gotta go--these squaddies ain't writin' themselves.
smell ya later~!
todd

jonah hex

okay...

months ago, when the first preview for it came out, my father said, "hey--you know what looks like it might be good...jonah hex." i said, yeah, and i hear that it's cleaving close to the comic book version too. and he said, oh, there's a comic book? and i said, don't you remember ever seeing me with some jonah hex comic books when i was a kid. and he said, you had so many--no, i don't remember any jonah hex.
so, i told him all about jonah and his origins as a comic book character back in the 70s, and how he's recently had a very successful revival and how he'd really dig the stories of a bounty hunter in the gritty old west.
and i brought him a few random issues a few days later and he ate them up.
loved them.

now, my dad says that he remembers reading a few comic books when he was a kid, superman's mostly, but that was it for his interest.
when i was a kid and fell so in love with them, he really couldn't be bothered, his comments revolving more around how much my comics might be worth someday.
when i got a job actually writing comics, well, he was proud--and is the one person in my life who i can say has read every comic i have ever written. he awaits the publication of each book, reads it, and gives me his feedback (almost always favorable...) and is more supportive of my writing career than anyone. period. not even my mom, when she was alive, and who was my cheerleader all my life, was able to read everything (she had trouble following some of the artist's storytelling...), but my father...his pride and support mean more than i can say.

so, we went to see jonah hex last night.
i have stated here in this blog and elsewhere that i, sadly, frustratingly, am a comic book purist and believe that they should use the comics as storyboards and just bring that sucker to life. i realize that that's not realistic and that if hollywood can be relied on to do anything, it's mess up a good thing. my dad has heard me lament about the changes and transmutations in many other comic book based films and has learned to wave me off, chilling me out with, yeah, but it was a fun movie.

so, i'm not giving anything away here when i say that in the first two minutes they show (their version) of how jonah got that horrible scarring on his face...and my dad turns to me and says (and i don't mind 'cause we're the only people in the theater...) "wait--i thought the indians did that. oh, they've ruined it already."
i laughed so hard...

yeah, they hollywoodized it. they filled it with gadgets and explosions and twisted his mythos all up in a knot.
josh brolin did a fantastic job as jonah--even under that restrictive make-up--meagan fox looked hot and all the actors played it well.

but it was a fun movie.
with dad.








~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


five for friday!
chain reaction
okay...so only two people played our chain reaction five for friday the other day, so maybe that's not one of the more popular variations of the game and we'll retire it for a while--though i thank both warren and brian wholeheartedly for jumping in and having fun with it--thanks so much, guys!

as i've said before, the following are the chains i initially came up with--but that doesn't mean that other's don't work. i was happy to see that between them, brian and warren provided all the answers...

1.
book
club
sandwich
board
meeting

2.
bridge
toll
house
wine
bottle

3.
beach
towel
dry
martini
glass

4.
lamp
light
house
party
trick

5.
school
play
ball
pit
bull



smell ya later!
todd

cool videos and five for friday!

okay...

i got this 'e' from our pal warren (newsom) the other day and it's some cool stuff to share...



Hi! Dunno if you go here or not, but this site, io9, is pretty awesome. Check out these vids. They’re fake (they tell you that up front), but they’re pretty danged good.

http://io9.com/5570400/mind+blowing-archive-of-footage-showing-ghosts-ufos-and-more



being fascinated by this stuff, i am always eager to see any photos or video of absolutely anything paranormal. i view each one with hope and wonder, anxious to see something that just baffles the mind...and passes the scrutiny of all the various film and photography experts. i WANT it to be true...
sadly, there are hoaxsters out there who don't realize that every time they pull a prank like that it sets the real research back about ten steps in terms of believability and respectability. but i am hoping that, with the advent of cell phone cameras, flip cameras and the like, that we will be seeing even more strange images popping up that just defy explanation.


five for friday!

chain reaction!~
connect the words down the list to complete the chain...

example;

fried
c
l
u
yours

fried
chicken
leg
up
yours





: )

have fun!


1.
book
c
s
b
meeting

2.
bridge
t
h
w
bottle

3.
beach
t
d
m
glass

4.
lamp
l
h
p
trick

5.
school
p
b
p
bull



have a great weekend!
smell ya later!
todd

happy birthday, mike~!

okay...

no blog yesterday 'cause i was just too busy--running all over town with mike and matt's mom and dad--shirley and cecil--who came to visit sharon and i fora couple of days! we had a wonderful time that was all too short and both cecil and mama shirley told tales on mike and matt (dude, i'm gonna hafta call you out on a couple of the things i heard... : ) ...

i also put the blog off 'til today, 'cause today is mike's birthday--he would have been 47 today and laughing at the stories his parents told on him, laughing at the story of his father and my favorite waitress in matt's favorite diner, laughing that i had both of our father's together in the same room (you win, you win.), grousing about the way hollywood just had to screw around with jonah hex, infuriated about the oil spill, comforting me (still) over the loss of jake, and drawing some of the most amazing comics we'd ever see!

most of it, you'll notice though, is laughing...

happy birthday, partner!

technical difficulties

okay...

i received a few emails from several members of our perhapa-family reporting that there is some problem with the blog, that, in some cases, people can't click past the first page, that initial perhapa-blog page that list the last four or five entries with the titles and a small snippet of the post. i've passed this on to craig and kieran, our resident computer genius, and, at this point, my only report is that we're looking into it. well, they're looking into it. actually, i think it's gotten to the point where just kieran is looking into it. which is good--that's usually when things like this get fixed...
i'll keep you posted.

(some kind of url confusion or something like that...)

i don't really have all that much to say today...
hope you all had an enjoyable weekend and a wonderful father's day!
i had dinner with my dad and immediate family, had a customarily loooooong conversation with my extra father, and i will be enjoying the company of my extra parents this week when the wieringos stop by for a few days during their summer excursion up through the northeast!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

here's a pretty cute prank that was sent to me by alison!
thanks!


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdfJq7Xa4Mo

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

as i continue to have fun with the hulk, iron man, thor, etc. in the super hero squad, i've been finding myself picking up even more of the super hero squad figures and, as hasbro likes to put it, my squad is getting quite super...

i recently managed to acquire for my team--


--a captain america--with cool shield accessory--and red skull--with also cool cosmic cube!



--and cyclops and marvel girl, who, i just realized, came accessory-less...



at this point, realizing that i do have a collector's mentality (i try to fight off my urges to collect 'em all!,)--still, i like to have the characters i've written and the figures that are just...too cool!
so i ask you...who have you got? how many have you got? how super is your squad?




~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

as for the glorious return of the five for friday,
not a lot of you logged in...
but that's okay...brian nailed 'em all except the first one,
and colin swung in valiantly and got that!
they are as follows...



1. "i'll shine up my old brown shoes,
put on a brand new shirt,
get off early from work,
if you'll say..."

"i want you to want me"--cheap trick

2. "don't run back inside, darlin', you know just what i'm here for.
so you're scared and you're thinkin' that maybe we ain't that young anymore..."

"thunder road"--bruce springsteen

3. "i was talkin' with a friend of mine,
said a woman had hurt his pride,
told him that she loved him so then,
turned around and let him go."

"don't do me like that"--tom petty and the heartbreakers

4. "when are you gonna come down...?
when are ya goin' to land...?"

"goodbye yellow brick road"--elton john

5. "if there's a bustle in your hedgerow, don't be alarmed now..."

"stairway to heaven"--led zepplin

that's it for today!
i gotta run!
smell ya later!
todd

flying things and the return of the five for friday!

okay...

some people eat--i get on ebay...

not that it happens all that often, but during those times when i'm feeling a little down, a little empty inside--those times when people who are emotional eaters claim they eat the most--i've noticed that i tend to become nostalgic and, since the advent of ebay, i tend to bid on items that, one way or another, take me back to a more innocent time...
this is not healthy.
it doesn't last for long, but, well...i don't have a lot of room here in my little office and if i keep this up they're going to put me on hoarders. granted, i'll have the coolest stuff you've ever seen on hoarders, but it's still not good.

so, anyway, for years i've been searching and tracking down cool toys that i remember from my childhood, whether i had them or a friend had them or maybe i just remember seeing it advertised on tv or in a comic book. i don't buy them all--that would be too much--but it is cool to see them, get a look at the photos, see if memory served well.
one of the things that i did have and that i have been looking for since i first discovered ebay, were these crazy foam airplanes made by, i was pretty sure, topps, the folks who made the baseball cards and, more up my alley, crazy novelty items like wacky packages. these planes were wicked cool 'cause they featured cartoon-y designs and characters that you could collect and assemble your self and fly 'em around the neighborhood with your friends! they were awesome!

the only problem was...i just couldn't seem to remember the name of the things...!

were they...freaky flyers...? wacky wings...? goofy gliders...?

i remembered one was a hot dog...a flying hot dog!! ha! or did they call it a frankfurter...?
one was a guy with a really big nose! ha! and another...was it a mop...?

it tried every single one of those as keywords for my search--and every combination! both in ebay and on google, hoping that at least i'd find reference and maybe catch the brand name that way...

as you can see, when i finally found them i also found why they were so hard to find. i can't think of a more innocuous name to go looking for. type in "flying" you get about a ka-billion results. type in "things" and it's triple that.

but i finally found them and here they are.
i can't help but think that these would STILL be great toys and that topps should strongly consider reissuing this bunch. they are funny and i remember them being a lot of fun!

(i really thought there was a banana or a banana split one... hmmm...)








and here are a couple of the cool things and photos i found during my rather exhausting search...




and, apparently, marvel and topps got together way back in the 60s to make some cool gliders of their own! it is surmised that these were the first marvel merchandise ever--wow. look how far that's come...
please, re-issue THESE marvel and topps!! now!!




~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

rich woodall just sent me this and you gotta check it out.
you KNOW i WANT to believe--especially anything bigfoot!
what i find difficult to believe is that this guy's name is "pork"...!


http://www.wsoctv.com/news/23937399/detail.html?hpt=T2

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

five for friday
music!

yeah, we all know lotsa lyrics to lotsa songs--but will you recognize them written out here, out of context...?
for the sake of sanity, i stuck with what they call "classic rock" so that we don't get too far away from anything recognizable...here are snippets of lyrics from five classic tunes for you to identify.
have fun!


1. "i'll shine up my old brown shoes,
put on a brand new shirt,
get off early from work,
if you'll say..."

2. "don't run back inside, darlin', you know just what i'm here for.
so you're scared and you're thinkin' that maybe we ain't that young anymore..."

3. "i was talkin' with a friend of mine,
said a woman had hurt his pride,
told him that she loved him so then,
turned around and let him go."

4. "when are you gonna come down...?
when are ya goin' to land...?"

5. "if there's a bustle in your hedgerow, don't be alarmed now..."

have a great weekend!
smell ya later!
todd

lauren and jake

okay...

wednesday, wednesday, wednesday...what do we do for wednesday...

well, here i am, hip-deep in a super hero squad story where the squaddies are all cowboys in the old west (a very blatant rip-off of one of my favorite movies of all time) and i'm having to trim down my too-ambitious outline 'cause i don't have enough pages. so i'm in the what to cut stages and that's always mildly frustrating. for those of you keeping track, it's scheduled for the november issue.

but i really just wrote that as a way to, hopefully, segue into this...although now i don't really have a connector...so let's just jump into it...


so the other day i'm talking with our friend and upcoming perhapanauts artist, lauren monardo, who is working on a back-up story about choopie and the gremlins called "goodbye, larry". you might remember lauren as the hugely talented illustrator of the wildly popular and extremely cute the slightly askew adventures of inspector ham and eggs (available at their website www.inspectorham.com or for your cool kindle at amazon.com)

now, when i say "talk" i mean emaillically, and in one of our back-and-forths, lauren mentioned that she wasn't caught up on the blog and hadn't seen new posts in a few weeks. when i told her about losing jake she was beside herself as our conversations usually contain plenty of talk about jake did this and jethro did that and many of her photos on her facebook feature her boy jethro.

a day or so later i received this and it was my turn to be beside myself. i commented that i don't know if jake was ever such a gentleman, but i was so moved ...
...that i had to share it with all of you.




thank you so much, lauren.
what a wonderful piece.

smell ya alter!
todd

dark days

okay...

so one of the things craig and i are always hearing when we're at shows or conventions or store signings is, "hey--when are you gonna collect all of those elusive, hard-to-find (which mean the same thing...) perhapanauts stories from your early dark horse runs...?" or "when will we have those two fantastic miniseries bound in one massive tome that can sit on the shelf next to my beautiful perhapanauts: triangle trade paperback?" or "do you know where geoff johns' table is?"

well, perhapa-fans--the wait is over...!
check this out--



FIRST BLOOD AND SECOND CHANCES
Image Comics collects the hard-to-find origin stories of the Perhapanauts

Berkeley, CA - 10 June 2010 - How did Bigfoot, a chupacabra, the Mothman and an assortment of other people, human and fantastic alike, become part of an organization dedicated to protecting the world from the strange and terrible creatures that lurk in the dark? THE PERHAPANAUTS, VOL. 0: DARK DAYS by writer Todd Dezago and artist Craig Rousseau will answer that question on September 8, 2010.

THE PERHAPANAUTS, VOL. 0 collects in one massive tome, for the first time, the time-lost tales of the Perhapanauts from their hard-to-find FIRST BLOOD and SECOND CHANCES miniseries! See the origins and early adventures of the most mysterious, thrilling and, at times, hilarious paranormal team in comics! This is where it all started! The book also features several back-up stories and a pin-up gallery by some of the industry's finest!

“Arisa, Big, Choopie, and all the agents of Bedlam had the start somewhere,” states Dezago. “DARK DAYS collects their origin stories with all the action, supernatural crime fighting and humor you expect of THE PERHAPANAUTS! We’re pumped to make these stories accessible to new and old fans alike.”

THE PERHAPANAUTS, VOL. 0: DARK DAYS, a 240-page full color trade paperback for $17.99, will be in stores September 8, 2010.





so start your christmas shopping early--this one's gonna be sweet!
we numbered it 'ZERO' so you'll know where it goes on your bookshelf. you're welcome.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

and over on the other side of my career...


i got so caught up in all the stuff we were looking at last week, that i forgot to mention that super hero squad! #6 hit the stands last wednesday and it is just chock-full of savage land-y fun!
in a story that was originally s'posed to be a humorous homage to mike's and my savage land story from way back in sensational spider-man's no.s 13-15, the squaddies race to the home of ka-zar and shanna to stop stegron from rallying his dinosaur troops to take over the world! when my editor, nate cosby, asked me if i'd do this (he was a huge fan of the original tale...) i said absolutely--can we use spider-man? he said absolutely and so i got to work writing up the story. two months later we found out that, actually, no, we can't use spider-man (i know...! crazy, right? but it was actually due to the animation licensing agreements...who knew?) and so we had to come up with another teenaged marvel character to retro fit into the action. i want to thank speedball for stepping in at the last minute--i think he did a really fine job and hope to use him again in an upcoming adventure...!




have a great week!
smell ya later!
todd

sparkle paints and hulk-crazy!

okay...

when i was 5, i had these super-cool sparkle paints...




they were just...awesome! you got five different sparkly paints that were kinda thick and pasty...and you'd get to paint your favorite marvel characters and make them look even awesome-cooler!




i know i was five, 'cause i'd just gotten my tonsils out.
whaddaya mean, ya don't believe me...?!
look--here's pictures of me with it!

here's me and my dad working on captain america!




...and me and my grandpa giving thor some sparkle!




see...i told ya i had them...!


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

lately, i've been going a little hulk-crazy.

i think it's 'cause i'm having so much fun with him as the 'joey' in the super hero squad and it's made me appreciate the character even more! also, i've been doing some research to find just the right goofy old marvel villains to pit the squaddies up against and the hulk has an amazing number of just wacky, off-the-wall badddies to choose from! some of them were just ridiculous and I CAN'T WAIT TO USE THEM! (look out toad men!!)





so i've been very hulk-focused, buying some back issues offa ebay, reading the john byrne run of both incredible hulk and his (hilarious!!!) she-hulk run(s)--truly, john byrne is not only a comics legend, but a treasure--these she-hulks are just pure comics candy! thank you, byrnsie!--and i even checked out the hulk movie--the latest one--which i had given a pass to. mostly, 'cause i'd seen the 2002 ang lee version and was less-than-impressed with that. but, on matt's recommendation, i dvr'd the newest ed norton version and MAN, was that good!! i loved it! if, like me, you let it get by 'cause you were disappointed with the first try, check this out!

so, i'm a little hulk-crazy these days...
what kinda craZy are you?

smell ya later~!
todd

warren's report from heroescon!

okay...

just because i wasn't there doesn't mean i don't have something for you from last week's heroescon!
our pal--and ace reporter--warren newsom sent me a passel of pictures showing all the gang having fun and rockin' the weekend! (see--i told you guys you didn't need me there...)

here they are in no apparent order...



suzanne and matt at the RINGO Scholarship table--miss you guys!


our generous photojournalist and winning artist of the perhapanauts three page challenge a few months back, warren newsom, with amber atoms writer/artist/creator kelly yates


matt, craig, and kelly


i, too, love looking over the shoulders of my favorite artists when i can to watch the magic happen. here, warren gets a shot of our pal--and boothboy extraordinaire--brian doing just that.



another angle where we can see old friends chris kemple and rich case! hi, guys!



for the past few months craig (and matt and suzanne and etc...) have 'gently' been trying to guilt me about missing this summer's conventions. here, one of my besties sends a heartfelt message...
miss you too, mark.



warren did manage to get a couple costumes for us--here's red skull, rogue, and captain america!



hey!?! howcum red skull gets a kiss?!? he's a freakin' nazi super-villain!



thanks, warren! great job!
have a great wednesday, everybody!
smell ya later!
todd

volkswagens, beyonce, and lunch with the gang

okay...

so here's something that's bugging me--why is volkswagen pushing it?
punch-buggy is a great game that started way back in the 60s with the introduction of the first beetles and gaining a new generation of punchers with the introduction of the new beetle in 2003. along with being lotsa fun (i've played variations which would be better labelled "kiss-buggy"...) it is, in a very round-about way, some fantastic advertising. i play it in the car with sharon (gently, she bruises like a peach) and more aggressively with my nephew, tyler (him, i pound.) "punch-buggy blue, no punch backs!"

now volkswagen wants us to punch for every one of their products?! to treat every volkswagen like it's as special as the bug?!
for us to start recognizing every model and including it in the game...?!
i don't think so, volkswagen! you've gone too far!
this is our game and you can't change the rules...!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

on the upside, here's a fun new game. or rather, trick...? stunt? i dunno...
tyler taught it to me and because we tend to let burps fly around this house and not politely stifle them like my mother, god rest her soul, taught me to do, we love it. (sharon, of course, will deny that she participates, she will tell you that she is a lady and she is a delicate flower--but trust me, she tries.)

the game is to, when you've got a good burp coming on, to try to say "beyonce". tyler and i drank soda all last weekend and tried to do it, but it's hard. he says that jordyn (my niece) has done it twice at home, but that she's a gifted athlete. i've managed the first two syllables--"BEE-ON–" but have lost momentum and fizzled out. it's hard, at first, to condition yourself to say it, to be ready, and for the longest time, we were simply burping and following it by saying "beyonce", like, instead of excuse me. that's okay--that's part of the learning curve. but try it out and let me know how you do...

beyonce.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

another while i was away...

as i've posted here several times before, i feel blessed to live (and have grown up in) this particular section of the hudson valley, in the heart of the new york state farmlands, at the foot of the catskill mountains. it's so lush and beautiful here and every season is gorgeous. this area also is home to many talented comics professionals and, a friendly bunch, we all get together fairly regularly for lunch and to chat and catch up and see what everyone else is up to. we sit at the feet of the masters and listen to their tales of earlier days in the business and laugh and eat and take pictures.

we usually call it "having lunch with joe" as it all started as a way to get joe sinnott out of his house and get him to tell us stories of the early marvel days. on thursday, may 20, terry got us all together and we did it again, had a great time (although a part of me thinks that it wasn't so much to get joe out of the house as much as to maybe cheer me up a little--terry does things like that, but he'll never admit to them...)

so here we are.



going up one side of the table and down the other, starting from bottom left is

fred hembeck, his wife, lynn moss, bob wiacek, joe sinnott, terry austin, ron marz, dan green, jim starlin, mark sinnott, walt simonson, ramona fradon, joe staton, and me.

always so much fun, never enough time.


and before we go, here's a cute picture of a fox that dani sent me.




have a great monday!
smell ya later!
todd

LOST

okay...

so, another thing that happened while we were away, was the conclusion of lost.
lot of emotion there. yes, on the show, but also amongst the various die-hard fans aka--losties.
i'm a lostie. craig is. scott and rich woodall are. matt is. mike was.

the only person i haven't had a chance to talk to about the ending so far is matt--we need to hash it out and break it down...once he gets back from charlotte. he and scott--and apparently rich--were the guys who were a little concerned, as time went on and the end drew near, that we weren't gonna get answers to many of the lingering questions about the island and the motivations of some of the characters. craig and i were more of the "hey--let's wait and see what happens..." philosophy and sat back to watch it all unfold.

personally, i loved it. yes, there were a lot--A LOT--of questions that were left hanging, but...in the end, they just didn't matter to me anymore.
the joy was in the journey.



so here's the email rich hit craig and i with a day or two later, voicing his concerns--and craig's reply.
and my reply to that.
(don't miss the youtube link at the bottom...)


(from rich)
So, I keep going between I’m ok w/ how Lost ended, and being pissed off… back and forth, I see both sides, for some reason today is a pissed off day here’s why…

Every season except this one has been focused on one major question "what is the island" this season they introduced a new question... "what is the sideways timeline?"

So, if for 6 years I'm telling you you're going to win this awesome prize, and every week for 6 years I tease you with the prize... oh, you really want that prize now don't you... next week I'll give you a clue... oh hey, here's that clue, it's black! Oh, now you want to know what that prize is even more! Here's another clue... after all you've been waiting a year now for this clue: "it's really fast!" speculation flies!!! Is it a car, a jet, maybe a space ship... Here are some more clues... you can travel really really far with it.. "OH MAN!!! I think it's a rocket ship!!!" Here's another clue... it has something to do with Greek Mythology.... "OH MAN, IT'S TOTALLY A ROCKET, CAUSE ALL THE NASA MISSIONS HAVE TO DO WITH GREEK GODS AND STUFF!!! OR IT COULD BE... BLA BLA BLA, SPECULATION SPECULATION SPECULATION" Hey guys, it's the final year of the contest!!! You guys Excited? "YEAH!!! Could be a Rocket!!! Woo Hooo!!!" Oh, hey by the way, in addition to that super cool prize we've been hinting at the last 6 years, they're also a little prize... here's a clue "it's little and round.." "Oh, cool, a 2nd prize, that's great! Maybe it's a ball or something... little and round... what could that be? Hmm... don’t' know, but I can't wait to find out if it's a Rocket or not!!!!" Hey guys, another clue about the big prize... we're getting close now hu? Yeah! Hey, here's the clue... you can travel through time with it!!! "NO SHIT!!! OMG, WHAT COULD IT BE, YOU CAN ACTUALLY TRAVEL THROUGH TIME W/ THIS THING? HOLY SHIT!!!" Oh, and not only that, that other thing, it's brown and yellow... "oh, cool, it's brown and yellow... little... round... hmmm... maybe a bee? Wow time travel... cool!!!"

Guys... here we are... last show, we're totally going to tell you what that big thing is, we swear "TIME TRAVELING ROCKET!!! SWEET!!!!" yeah... you guys ready... only 2.5 hours til you find out what the prize is!!! YEAH, let's go!!!!

2.25 hours later "And now, you've been waiting 6 years to find out what the prize is... it's a... HEY LOOK... THERE'S THAT OTHER THING... IT'S A PIECE OF SHIT! Oh,time's up! Bye!"

Wha… what… WHAT ABOUT THE FUCKING TIME TRAVELING GREEK ROCKET?!?!?!


(from craig)
wait, so you REALLY don't think they answered what the island is...?

it's an island. one that is connected to the "light" (a spark of which resides in every living person) and that light needs a guardian to protect it. a guardian who can live for millennia and has the power to protect the light and set the "rules" of the island in order to protect it (and move the island and cloak it from outsiders who want to take the light... )

the black smoke is evil. personified by the man in black (and then locke) , the evil was released when the MIB went into the light (we know it was bad to enter that light because we were told it was by the previous guardian).

is there some mysticism and magic ... sure. did they explain it away with midiclorians? thankfully, no.

now, you may not LIKE it and wish it was something else, but it's pretty clear that was the intent.

and really, the story was not about the island, but the redemption of the characters who were "lost" figuratively and literally.



(my reply)

perfect, c.~!
i couldn't have said it better.
no one could.

i was very happy with it all and, though sad it's over, agree that, like life, the story is the journey. what an awesome journey... i will sorely miss those wonderful characters, and while i agree that there has never been a tv show like it before--and i don't think there will ever be one just like it--i think that lost and it's creators have set a very high bar that imaginative minds in the future will strive to attain. i think that lost was a gift. and that it will only inspire those who come after to captivate and entrance us in the same way.
i hope.

so, wait...what's the greek rocket...?




rich wanted me to add this...
http://www.collegehumor.com/video:1936291


that's it!
have a great weekend!
if you're at heroescon,
have a great convention!
smell ya later~!
todd

christian's creature

okay...

so, while i was away, a whole bunch of things happened.
i'll post (kinda retro-post...) some of them over the next week or so.

first up, in cryptid news, is this article and photo that christian sent me early last week.


HIDEOUS, UNIDENTIFIABLE MYSTERY CREATURE DISCOVERED IN CANADA





The strange and rather horrible-looking body of, er ... something ... was found in Big Trout Lake up in Northern Ontario. No one quite knows what it is, but guesses include various cryptids like the Chupacabra as well as more mundane beasts like a dead river otter, or possibly a bear cub.

Some locals say it could also be a semi-legendary omajinaakoos, a creature that apparently used to roam Northern Ontario eating beavers and otters ... or maybe that's just a myth, too. Cryptomundo is calling it the Bald Beast of Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug, which can't be right because that's way too long to be the title of a Syfy Saturday night monster movie.

Any guesses?

http://scifiwire.com/2010/05/hideous-unidentifiable-my.php


like the montauk monster of two summers past, this thing looks like it's suffered the unfortunate effects of being (partially) submerged. in, what...bleach? if you read the comments that go with the article you'll see that badgers and wolverines are favored as explanation and that, rightly so, queries as to why there's only one picture abound. i agree. and yet i can't stop looking and wondering and hoping that maybe this is some strange new unidentifiable creature that we've never seen before. maybe one that hasn't been able to be seen until just recently...




another thing that happened while i was taking my break was the oil spill which just sucks.
we are sheep, we are in the dark, and we HAVE NO IDEA how devastatingly horrible this is, how monumentally destructive this is going to be, how environmentally catastrophic and irreversible this is. we are being lied to and placated. the facts as to how destructive this spill is and it's far-reaching, long-term effects on our planet are being fed to us slowly, seeping out over time so that the horror of it becomes vague and everyday. comedians are making jokes about it.
and what will happen as a result? will we see the error of our ways and change our laws, our policies, our way of life? will we just say, as we always do, the ends justify the means? does it? at the cost of our oceans? our swamplands? our water? so that we have more oil? cheaper oil?
i don't know a lot, but i know a lot of people make their living along the gulf coast.
well...they did.

sux.

smell ya later~
todd