Spock learns to play a game

Even Spock (Zachary Quinto) learns something new every day. In this case, he learns to play Rock-Paper-Scissors-Lizard-Spock game, a rather nerdish game that is played by the nerds on "The Big Bang Theory."

Townish Fantasies

Last night, I was watching the first episode of The Secret Circle. The show seems to be another teen-angst clone along the lines of The Vampire Diaries. But that is not what I want to talk about.

What I want to talk about is the use of a small town.

Why is it that so many television shows have the supernatural showing up in small towns?

A short list of suspects:

Smallville (ok, it was mainly superheroes and supervillians, but there was some magic also)
Supernatural
Buffy the Vampire Slayer
The Vampire Diaries
True Blood (if I am not mistaken---I am guilty of not paying much attention to that show)
Roswell (ok, aliens, but it fits the theory I am about to expound upon)

I am quite sure that I missed some. Compare these shows with series that have the supernatural and unusual happening in big cities.

Another list:

New Amsterdam
Highlander the Series
Forever Knight
Moonlight
Angel

(I am not sure if Charmed happened in a small town or city.)

So from this information, we can make a guess. If you are a teenager and stumble across a secret that humanity is not meant to know, odds are that you are living in a small town where everyone knows everyone. And if you are an adult who just figured out that vampires and immortals are real, then odds are that you are living in a big city.

I am quite sure that there is a deeper literary theory to this...but I will be damned if I am going to come up with it given the fuzzy state of my mind tonight.

Is is just me? Doctor Who filler vs core arc stories

Last night, I watched the Doctor Who episodes Night Terrors and The Girl Who Waited. Maybe it is just me, but I think that the random filler stories are more entertaining than the episodes of the core story arc (Doctor's Death/River Song). But then again, I am an old fashioned type of Whovian.

Previous to the modern era (in my opinion), Doctor Who did long story arcs much better. Or at least, they were more entertaining.

I found Let's Kill Hitler pretty lame in places. I was not fooled for a second by the whole Mel ploy. The instant I saw the red car, I knew it was stolen and that there was only one person who regularly helps herself to other people's stuff in this particular season (Series 6 or 32 depending on how you want to count it).

Even the most under-rated long story arc of the previous era, Trial of a Time Lord, was more interesting. But that may just be me. After all, I am a Colin Baker fan.

(Note that I like Matt Smith; it is just that I can't help but compare the current episodes to Trial of a Time Lord which was the first long arc Doctor Who story I ever saw.)

Dont Blink Cat (Doctor Who)

Don't blink, don't look away from it, or the cat will get you.

MafiaWars has a TARDIS

Here is something that I stumbled across in MafiaWars (one of those silly Facebook games that I occasionally play)---a TARDIS. Ok, it is not a TARDIS; it is a chronobooth. It can be found in the Time Travel mystery crates. It is a rare (not sure what category it is in) with 109 attack and 133 defense. Gee, a chronobooth almost looks exactly like a TARDIS, doesn't it?

No clue what it all went wrong

Believe it or not, this picture originally started out as a picture of Sarah Palin for my ongoing Magic the Gathering NOT series. And it drifted away from the original concept to being...this. 

Morgan Drake Eckstein is a geek and a nerd

Yes, I---the wonderful Morgan Drake Eckstein---am both a geek and a nerd. Probably less geek than nerd, but that is only due to the lack of monetary funds. In this picture, you can see one of my cats, Merlin (actually, he is my wife's cat), a book and mediation and the kabbalah, a book on Freemasonry. a collection of Tomb Raider comics, the first volume of the Mage saga by Matt Wagner, a thumb-drive, a digitual (tape) recorder, my trusty Neo (think keyboard with a primitive word processing program), and a Doctor Who scarf that one of my sisters made me. This blog entry is a contest entry---I am trying to prove that I am a geek. Wish me luck.