Whine and Cheese

I bought my first lawn mower when I moved in my house in 2001. It's just like the one I grew up using, a 20" gas-powered mower. It's done a great job for all these years, but last week while I was mowing it seemed to be giving me a near-death rattle. The motor wasn't running as smoothly and it seemed to struggle quite a bit.

Since then, I've been looking online at different mowers. I have been wanting to try something different, so I've been spying the electric lawn mowers. Buying gas for the old mower is a pain, so I'd like to see about avoid it. Battery-powered ones have their ups and downs, mostly linked to battery life. Corded ones have their drawbacks as well, as many folks have told me about running over the electric cord.

On the way home from work today, I stopped at Home Depot to look at the furry eye candy... er, to comparison shop for mowers. They didn't have much in the way of electric mowers. The only model in stock was battery-powered and expensive. However, just next to it was something that caught my eye, something I'd not seen for a long time.

A manual reel mower.

The design is a bit fancier than the mowers I remember, but it principles are very much the same. I've never used one. My dad had one, but it literally sat outside in a corner of the yard, like a prop or a decorative item. The blades and wheels on it had long rusted in place, so it was completely non-functional.

So, on a lark, I bought one. It's far cheaper than the powered mowers and the online reviews are actually very positive. It's must quieter than powered models and, while it requires a bit more effort by me, it should be good for a cardio workout. For my 1/4 acre yard, which is 1/3 wooded, it may be an effective stop-gap while I continue a search for the electric mower. I put it together tonight after my chest/back workout.

I'm very eager to try it out tomorrow after work.

I've always enjoyed the Giffen-era "Legion of Super-Heroes" from back in the 1980s. I loved the artwork. It was the era when I started reading the Legion, learning about how each Legionnaire had to have one unique power to belong, sometimes with heroes only having one power.

Sometimes the heroes had some pretty weak powers. Duo Damsel was one of those, having the ability to split into two identical selves, each having no other power. While in reality, it would be a very cool and practical power, being able to get so much more done. In the comic book world, it hardly put her at Superman levels. Still she was a favorite of mine.

One of my favorite quotes was from Duo Damsel.

"The best part of the LSH is how heroes with relatively weak powers can combine to become highly effective."

I enjoyed how a hero with a single power could be useful in certain circumstances. So for fun, in the comments, tell me your power and your "kid, boy, girl..." code-name. Remember, you have to have a power no one in the Legion has to be eligible to be Legionnaire.

Mine would be "Replay Lad," who had the power of psychometry, allowing him to see past events when he touched objects or people. And of course, he could fly using the Legion flight ring.

This week has been a busy one and an irritating one, the latter part due mainly to my own actions.

Tuesday night, I finally took the plunge and updated my iPhone operating software to the latest version. I often hold off doing the updates because they sometimes have issues and I'd rather wait and let others try it first. So after finally caving in to the update, I found that my iPhone no longer would be recognized by iTunes on my desktop.

Checking the software status on iTunes, I found it was the most recent version. According to a web search, I needed to update my Mac mini's operating software. So I downloaded the updated overnight, as it took over three hours. The next morning, I did the install of the OS X "El Capitan" system. It warned me that Photoshop and Microsoft Office wouldn't work, but I had hit go already. Insert "D'OH!"

The install was taking a while, so I went to work and dreaded what I'd encounter on my arrival home in the afternoon. And my fears were correct. While my iPhone will now sync to the updated iTunes, my Photoshop CS will no longer work, the system stating that the new operating system will not run Power PC programs. I tried to updated a few utilities to see if it would work, but no dice. I thought about buying a new version of Photoshop CS, but the last version on CD was CS6 and it costs $1200. Newer versions are now by online subscription, at a minimum of $9.99/month.

I debated on what to do next. I have relied on Photoshop to color my comic and other cartoons, but I'm not sure a subscription is worth the price, considering the limited reasons I use it. One option was to downgrade the operating software back to an earlier version to continue using my old Photoshop, but it would only be a stop-gap measure as I'll have to replace them both at some point once the software was no longer supported on any platform.

I've purchased Manga Studios 5 from Amazon and it should arrive tomorrow. From what I've seen, it seems to be able to do whatever I need, including reading old PSD files and creating new ones if necessary, as well as permitting a few new tricks. I'm hopeful. aceofspace and other friends have suggested alternate programs that might help, so I'll be looking into those in case the Manga software isn't going to work for me.

All of this because of my iPhone. Well, that's not necessarily fair. It was bound to happen eventually, I guess.

Odds and ends of the week thus far.

• After being off work for a week, Monday was a rough one. This time of year makes it hard to get out of bed with it being so cold. Even Maggie the Cat isn’t all energetic in the mornings any more.



• I watched a Netflix DVD last night called ”The Giant Behemoth. It was a 1959 monster movie about a radioactive dinosaur in England. It stars John Turner, who was the bearded hottie in “The Black Torment” I wrote about last week. He’s a bit younger in this one, with no beard or shirtless scenes, but it was good camp for a cheap movie. Some cool things about the movie was the special effects, which were primitive. The dinosaur didn’t breath fire, but would emit radioactive bursts that could roast a person, which happened quite a bit. And when the people of London were being evacuated, they must have used locals for background actors. A lot of the people in very tense dramatic moments could be seen nervously smirking or smiling and taking quick glances at the camera. In the scenes where they were running from the monsters, I was impressed to see these little old grannies really hoofing it.



• I finished the plotting of the next issue of my comic book last night. I just have to set up the panels and I will probably start drawing it tomorrow. Issue #16… wow…
.


• I have no NYE plans. My usual plans include attending the annual bash thrown by my softball buddy Thom and his hubby Jay, but this year they’re taking a break. They’ve even posted on FB that they have no plans themselves and have no idea what to do tonight. They just got back from a trip down South, so I’m sure they’ll be taking it easy anyway.



• I got my new ID badge at work today. My photo is very, VERY yellow. I look jaundiced. Nice that they used the DMV camera and that I’ll keep it for the next four years. Sigh… where is Photoshop when you needed it…

Happy Hump Day, all y’all!

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So before I packed up and headed south, I purchased a used DVD of "Black Christmas". I've written about this movie over and over again. I'm jokingly obsessed. I have no idea why, I just find the movie fascinating in odds ways.

Now I have the Blu-ray and a DVD copy already, this after I gave away another copy to a buddy, so why buy another? In my research online about the movie, I came across a nearly defunct website that listed some cool features on an earlier DVD release that strangely are missing from later DVD and Blu-Ray releases. So, I found a copy on Amazon Marketplace. It had been sitting at my post office while my mail was held during Christmas.

I got this DVD copy in the mail today and it's full of extras that are absent from the later releases -- good extras.


Black Christmas Movie Poster
Among the extras available are:

• Audio commentary by Director Bob Clark (he also directed "A Christmas Story" and "Porky's").
  
• Audio commentary by stars John Saxon and Keir Dullea.
  
• A "Revisited" Documentary.
  
• A Episode of a TV Series called "Dark Dreamers" staring John Saxon (not sure why this is on here, but okay... something more to watch)

What surprised me about the DVD is that there are even more extras as a DVD-ROM, yet the DVD doesn't even state this on the cover or the interior flier. I wouldn't have even known of them if I hadn't seen them on the aforementioned website.

The DVD-ROM includes a PDF press book for "Silent Night, Deadly Night," which was the original US release title; a PDF of their movie posters (the above pic is a portion of one of them); and (the best part) is a PDF of the original script, with crossed-out scene, hand-written pages, etc. It must have been a working script by the writers. It's nice to be able to read some of the lines that got a bit blurred in the movie. Even more fun was some of the cut scenes, which were actually pretty funny. This is probably one of the fun scenes in the movie, between Sergeant Nash and Barb (Margot Kidder) when she gets the best of the officer, using a word he's unfamiliar with.




Unlike most movies today, where they do whole "making of" documentaries to accompany a film, there is very little production documentation and photos I can find. It is rare that I delve so far into something like this. I have one more "piece" of the movie background to get. In my searches, I came across a paperback novelization of the film in 1976, released in Canada (where the movie was filmed), written from the screenplay. Supposedly, it contains extra scenes that are documented out, probably like the script I have. With the joys of the internet, I managed to find a used copy of a nearly 40-year-old paperback. It should be here next week.

I am such a geek. Seriously.

Genealogy and genetics have always fascinated me. It probably started long before I even knew what genetics was really. Everyone always made comments about me and the twin whenever they were told we were twins. "Wow, they don't look anything alike," people would say. We were amazingly opposite in appearance back then, the twin being slim and having that blond (nearly white) hair and hazel eyes in contrast to my stocky build and dark hair and eyes. Yet, looking at other family members, I saw familiar pieces in them in each of us.

Considering that it is supposed to be a dominant genetic trait, the dark hair and eyes appear in very few of us. In the 21 kids in my generation, only three of us do not have blue eyes -- my sis, the twin, and me -- and only I have those nearly black eyes where the pupils are hard to see without a light. I could play a Star Trek Betazoid without the need for colored contact lenses (geek reference).

One of the big mysteries in my family was where this dark hair and eyes came from. There is a "vein" of people in the family who have these characteristics -- my great-grandmother, my grandfather (her son), my mom (his daughter) and me and my sister. Doing the family tree provided no clues as the documentation wasn't the best and my family has been here for 170+ years (in the same county no less). We long suspected that we had some Native American ancestry. There was also the possibility of some Portuguese descent that is relatively common in Eastern Kentucky, or African genes that could have been undocumented.

A couple of years ago, guinnesscub posted his results from his "23andMe" DNA test that provided some info about his genetic diversity, where genetically his ancestors hailed from based on his DNA. I thought that was pretty cool and wanted to do it for some time. The FDA cracked down on 23andMe because of some disease diagnostic stuff in their data, so they aren't doing the test right now until it gets cleared up.

So around Christmas time, I bought the AncestryDNA kit online and sent it off for testing. Well, the results are in:



The results are only estimates, but they provide some clues to things and offer up a few surprises that go against what I had anticipated. The largest percentage is Western Europe which is primarily the areas of France, Germany, The Netherlands, Switzerland, etc., but may also include England and Denmark. We don't have a lot of family names that reflect these areas, but maiden names are hard to find. Great Britain includes England, Wales and Scotland, which were no surprises as I knew of several ancestors from those areas, but the percentage was a bit lower than I expected. Ireland was not a surprise either, but the lower percentage was, as I'd always guessed we had a lot more Irish ancestry.

The "trace region" data is curious to me, especially the "Iberian peninsula" data, which includes Portugal and Spain. This may actually support that the dark hair and eyes could be from ancestry of this region, which also is thought to be the reason for the "Black Irish" phenotype in Ireland.

One of the biggest surprises was that I had no Native American or African DNA. Having Native American ancestry was always a family rumor, but it seems it was just a rumor now.

I'm glad I did this because it was fun and informative. However, I admit I am curious now what the 23andme data set would have said about me for comparison.

I managed to walk through two days of the Cincinnati Comic Expo and had a good time. I even talked longtime MIA cubtharsis into joining the melee.

The main attraction for me was meeting George Perez. I got there as it opened and made a bee line for his booth. There was a small line already, which quadrupled in minutes after I got there.

I normally don't get ga-ga over celebrities. I admire their work, but as a person I don't feel the need to get autographs or photos. George Perez is one of the very few I have dreamed of meeting. I've been a fan of his for over 30 years and have tried to emulate his work, his amazing sense of detail, etc. After two hours in line, I got to the table where I asked him to draw Marvel's Hercules. It took him four minutes and then got a photo with him with the drawing. Yeah, I'm acting like a goober, but it truly does reflect how I felt at that moment -- pure amazement. It was a bucket list moment for me.


George drawing Hercules, George and Me with the Hercules drawing, and George working on Firestorm for another attendee
We ran around for the rest of the day, buying comic books, tee-shirts and posters, and saying hi to other friends who were attending.

Afterward, we went to dinner then cubtharsis and I hit the USS Nightmare for a scare, caught up over coffee at Starbucks, and hit the 701 Bar for a beer. I got home at 1 AM, exhausted.

I went back to the Expo yesterday for a couple of hours. George Perez had a much shorter line on day two. I heard that the crowded line had already been there and gone that morning. I got back in line and watched him draw Aquaman for a pretty blonde lady. I thought about getting Wonder Girl or Troia drawn, but instead wanted the long-haired and bearded version of Aquaman instead (it fits the bearish theme of the art on my walls in my comic book room). It was amazingly detailed and just stunning. Both of the pieces I had him do are below:


Hercules and Aquaman
After all that walking around on concrete floors, running my usual four mile run, and my chest and back workout, I'm worn out. I took today off to recover, but it was a great weekend.

[happy comic geek mode]

After a late start to work and even later start heading home, I was happy to stop by my local comic book shop to pick up a few things.


I snagged a copy of Infinite Crisis #1. Great artwork by Phil Jimenez and awesome cover by George Perez.

No spoilers, but that last page... WOW!!!!

... I never thought I'd see him appear in comics again.... :)

[/happy comic geek]