I have no patience with the incurious.  What can they learn about life and what can anyone know without learning. -Sylvester Milner in The House of a Thousand Lanterns, by Victoria Holt, 1974

Though I took a long rest, I was still feeling beat down, the remnants from a brief cold.  I’ve heard from others it can linger for weeks.  Not having done much fore-scouting for the music portion of SXSW, I thought I’d head to Waterloo Records and start from there.

Meanwhile, the people I knew that were here for SXSWi were catching their last lectures and mostly heading out of town.

It’s been two years since I’ve been to Waterloo and the neighboring ice house is no longer.  In its place is the 24 Diner.  I sat down and had a Dr Pepper to sooth the throat.  I was also offered a taste of the Avery Hog Heaven.  It was a very hoppy barley wine, and if I was feeling well it would have complemented my meal excellently.

I had a stuffed chard on a bed of wheat berries.  After having 4 slices of bacon with breakfast, the vegetarian option sounded good.  And it was.

I stopped by Waterloo.  It was a sedate shadow of what it will be over the next few days with a different band playing in-store every hour (including Cheap Trick Wednesday at 6!).  There were no copies of the weekly Austin Chronicle, and no dailies starting until Wednesday.

I briefly tried to catch up with Bill C. again, but he hopped out of town, exhausted after his daily lectures following minimal sleep.  Will killing time at The Ginger Man, trying two beers (Independence Oatmeal Stout was a delicious desert for my lunch), I pulled a book off the shelf (quoted above).  I read it there and have been continuing it.  Hopefully I can finish and re-shelve it before I leave town.

I headed back to my crash pad and got in some extra rest knowing I’ll need it over the next few days.

I don’t have a jacket or any rain gear with me either.  It will be a bit nippy tonight, and raining all day.

Yesterday, after I got settled into my cousin’s place, and did some grocery shopping, I headed into town.  I parked across MOPAC from Zilker Park and rode my bicycle into town.  It was a nice day for it, and gave me a chance to get used to some of the routes that might be useful later in the week.

I locked up the bike, almost left my pannier, but thought better of it, and found some lunch.  Darwin’s Pub had a nice Chicken Shawarma, though their beer selection was minimal.  Around 4pm, I headed over to Buffalo Billiards (even thinner, though larger, selection).  There was an informal iPhone Developers Meet-up.  It ended up having about a dozen people, about half had done development work.  So, I spent some time chatting and getting to know some people, mostly from Texas, though the organizer was from the UK.

One who I met was Jacqueline, and happened to attend the same high school as I did.  This happens more often than you might think.

After that I headed to the west side for a Houston organized party (Houstonians got free drink tickets, and a friend bought me another).  I saw quite a few Houston friends.  JR was camped out with a video camera.  (Ex Houston) Mayor Bill White showed up and had a brief chat.  He’s running for Governor.  I wish he was still our mayor, and will definitely vote for him for Governor.

Jacqueline had checked in on another party and then stopped by the Houston one.  We chatted for a while and suggested we try the FourSquare party.

FourSquare, Twitter, Gowalla, and (to a less extent) FaceBook are ALL OVER the SXSWi part of the conference.  So much that there are lots of anti-SXSW whiners on-line and #fakesxsw humor from the non-attendees.

We swang by the FourSquare and it had a line out the front, we tried out the BeerCamp at Emo’s.  Their Beer Pong tournament was over but free beer was still available for the waiting in line.  The rain started, we chatted under a tent with some young strangers (Austinites schooling in Lubbock, off for the spring break).

My iPod had died by this point, and I totally missed hooking up with my good friend Bill C.  I totally should have borrowed a phone and called (sorry Bill!).  Jacqueline suggested we try out Beauty Bar (a new one, I was unfamiliar with) as the rain continued.  I stayed there for a while, but decided I needed to get back to my car and/or bike, so I left her to stay out for the rest of the night (and I think she did).

I started walking to find a cab, to get to my car.  I was planning on abandoning my well locked bike.  But I got all the way to the bike and after consulting with the pedi-cab drivers decided that that I needed to come back and retrieve the bike.  Then I decided that I was already soaking wet and warm from the walk, so decided to ride to the car.  I got home about 12:30, had to strip clean to get dry and warm.

I was of course soaked to the bone and a bit muddy from the ride.  Thus the need to wash and dry my only pair of pants this morning.  Sounds like they’re ready for the dryer.

March 2, 1836 – Texas Revolution: At a convention inWashington-on-the-Brazos, the Mexican state of Texasadopted a declaration of independence from Mexico, establishing the Republic of Texas.

There have also been rumors that most of the Times’ content is going to go back behind the pay wall.  Assuming that is the case, I think there’s an obvious strategy for moving forward with their iPad pricing.

Initial price: $10, and that covers 3 months of content.  Get everyone hooked!  After that start charging $10/month.  Also, strategize how you might include minor and strategic advertising content into the app.  Possibly set up a new pricing scheme for advert-less versions.

Also, make sure you build in a “you can’t buy next month’s content until you upgrade the app to the newest version available – it’s free”.  This would enable you to enforce any new restrictions you add to the app and keep the majority of your customers on the same version.

Of course, I would prefer if it were free.  But that’s not how businesses work.  If they keep the entry cost low enough, it might be enough to get me back into the daily habit of reading the newspaper again.

When some people (like PC World) come up with lists of “What iPhone OS 4.0 Needs” they often lists items that are not thought about from a design direction at all.  They think of a task they want to perform, look at a previous solution for that task, and proclaim that the same solution is needed here. (To be fair, PC World does not invoke as much Fire & Brimstone as others who deliver this opinion.)

We don’t need a floppy drive on the iPhone.  No one is suggesting we do, but it was only a few years ago that people were wailing for their loss on a computer (How do we manage to install new software without them?).  Now people often state they need access to the underlying file system of their iPhone.  Their phone.  They need to get to the filesystem.  And browse it.  Why? why? why?

With the announcement of the new iPad running a newer version of the iPhone OS, no doubt these statements will grow louder.  Access to the filesystem oddly makes a lot of people’s lists.

OS X provides the Finder to me, and it provides Terminal to me. I’m sure my mother doesn’t know what Terminal is, and I know she’s not overly familiar with Finder.  She uses apps.  That’s what most people do.

Apple has dared to ask “can we remove file access entirely” from the user experience.  There are some cooler heads on the Internet that notice these are interesting ideas, and they may be fruitful.  Perhaps we should give them a chance.  The answer will likely be “not entirely”, but it can be different, better for 99% of users.

Kudos, AppleInsider for exploring these concepts in a non-mellowdramatic way.

So, which games did I play most in 2009?  Not surprising that the list falls to shorter games.

Three games were played more than 10 times: Dominion (15), Tichu (15), and Hive (12).  Dominion is a relatively quick game (30-45 mins), and I’ve introduced it to many people this year.  Tichu is a partnership, trick-taking card game that I’ve taken to this year.  There are certainly many partial plays of it that I did not keep track of.  Pictured here, we are passing some time in Marfa at Padres playing. (Photo: Jay Lee)

There are also certainly many Hive plays I did not record; I’ve taught it to several people at our weekly neighborhood gatherings at Onion Creek Cafe.

Falling into the Nickel category are Glory to Rome (8), Carcassonne (6), Dominion: Intrigue (5), and Monopoly Deal (5).  In this group, Carcassonne is likely the only one under documented.  It’s a game that I always enjoy and is quite flexible.

I don’t own a copy of Glory to Rome, and most of those plays were consecutive at a marathon session a year ago at Lone Star Game Fest.  Dominion: Intrigue is an spin-off of the ever popular Dominion.  Monopoly Deal is a simple set collection card game very nicely Monopoly themed; it’s more fun with more people.

A better camera: A 3 megapixel to 5 upgraded seems a minimal upgrade that should be expected. If it does include a better camera, it should also provide better programatic access to it. Allowing apps that use it to throttle the quality, especially those that use video, particularly streaming video. If you could stream low-res and save high-res at the same time, that would be ideal. It’s likely that cameras will appear in future iPod Touches as well, perhaps lower end versions.

Bigger and/or Better screen: The two aren’t the same thing obviously. Apple has been resisting the resolution “upgrade” because the one-size-fits-all has served their developers, and therefore their app breadth, well. Other platforms are already stratifying, and it’s not ideal. They will definitely need to provide the simulator support months in advance of hardwired availability, so that developers can confirm their products. They should also provide a way to run lower/original resolution applications, or risk minimizing available applications.

More customization: With each major release of the iPhone OS there are minor customization increases. There will be minor changes on this version and Dashboard-style widgets, custom backgrounds, or any other “skinning”-type functionality is unlikely. And in my opinion, unneeded.

A faster processor: Each hardware upgrade has included a processor improvement. Apple has no need or desire to be the fastest possible processor.  More speed = more battery use.   Apple will continue to err on the batter life improvement side.

Voice recognition throughout: Apple aims at the larger, non-technical market, and I think voice recognition and in particular voice dictation is a bleeding edge technology. This is still not available broadly on computers and mobile CPUs can’t handle it. The Nexus One offloads, necessarily, processing onto servers.  This bandwidth increase would be undesirable, particularly to an AT&T already straining from the needs of the iPhone.

Multi-tasking: This is most yearned for feature that is the most unneeded. Apps can currently remember their states if they care about their users. Having Apple “sleep” an app also leaves an ambiguity of when the user really wants to quit the app. There are definitely some functionalities Apple should open up to developers that happen to be background ones. (Audio Streaming a la NPR app – The stream should be on par with the Apple Music app.)

Greater Durability: I disagree with Dwight, iPhones are strong enough. Their screens are considerably larger than most which naturally makes them more vulnerable. And insurance is usually available for those unable to handle the iPhone safely.

Thinner and lighter: a competing design variable to Greater Durability.

Relaxed App Approvals: Apple did recently “stream line” its app approval process and items are getting through the pipeline much faster this month than two months ago.  A few more months are needed to see if this change is everything is needed.  This general heading in Dwight’s list is there only for a specific argument: Google Voice.   I would love to have that app, but any arguments are hard to make for lack of real information on why it hasn’t been green lighted.  Lots of rumors and speculation.

End Its AT&T Exclusivity: Apple chose AT&T on technological reasons. There are two (different, and not quite equal) 3G technologies. Apple chose the one that can provide more technically and the one that blankets Europe and Japan. There were also technical modifications made to AT&Ts infrastructure to allow the “audio voice mail” that would need to be made by other carriers. Cingular has the same type of network; Verizon would require the manufacture of a different type of phone. I don’t think the growth spurred by non-exclusivity would be large enough to bother production.

My caffeine of choice is Dr Pepper, but I enjoy a Mountain Dew now and then, and particularly like their recent Voltage, which was raspberry and citrus.

I also particularly like the sodas that are made with cane sugar rather than corn syrup.  This one turned out to be not as good as I hoped, but still decent.

Apparently this one became available in December and is for a “limited time only” – it says so right there on the can!

Dear Mrs. Farrar,

I just became aware of a public meeting this evening in regard to a newly
funded project to add feeder roads to I-10 inside the loop. I can not make
it to the meeting this evening to let you know how much I STRONGLY OPPOSE
this move!

There is NO good reason to expand or create ANY feeder road. I would highly
suggest eliminating some in several locations. If interstates need to be
expanded (which is a dubious claim itself according to many studies) then add
lanes to them. Adding feeders is NOT needed and I believe detrimental.

-Bill Shirley
Registered Voter
Houston 77007

cc:
Alicia Nuzzie, District Director
Lillian Ortiz, Chief of Staff

*State Representative Jessica Farrar will host an informational meeting on TXDot´s I-10 Feeder Road Project Wednesday, January 6, 2010 from 6:30-7:30pm at Stevenson Elementary (5410 Cornish St, 77007)

Kinsington Gate Apartments #304
100 – 10 A Street
Calgary, Alberta T2N 4T3
CANADA
403.270.4497
home: bshirley@titmouse.sccsi.com
work: Shirley_Bill@pcp.ca

Hard to believe it’s been 15 years!

Total Number of Games played: 51
Number of Different Games: 40
Number of New Games: 25

Ra – A classic Knizia bidding game that is out of print.  TG has a large distaste for it, because of the bidding mechanism, but many people like this one a lot.  I’m not a huge fan, but I’m always up for a game.

Vineta – The first time I’ve played this one.  It came out last year.  You secretly are responsible for one of the colors on the board.  In the mean time, everyone is trying to flood parts of the city, and take the colored tokens that are theirs.  Or preferable have them survive till the last part of the city is above water.

Tichu (x 4) – Tichu is a 4-player, partner, trick-taking card game.  It’s played with a standard deck plus four extra cards.  I’ve become quite fond of it, and try to play whenever I can.  I taught it to a few friends the first weekend, and played several games the second, once with two players that were much more experienced than I.

Vegas Showdown – This is a great game to lure in the non-games, yet the gamers usually enjoy it as well.  You are bidding on parts of a casino and each building your own better than the others.

Brass – This was a hot new game last year at BGG, and Austin friends Sharon and Adam brought it with them to Rob’s.  Martin Wallace is known for meaty board game design.  This was my first play and I liked it quite a bit.  Managing goods and routes through a canal age and a railroad age.

Carcassonne –  A classic tile-laying game that is good as a gateway game.  I recently introduced it to my nieces (13, 11, and they all liked it.  I like it for its flexibility.  If you pick it up, grab the European scoring off The Geek.

Dominion (x 4) – One of the biggest games of last year, it already has two expansions.  Each game you work with only 10 of 25 sets of cards that make it extremely flexible.  You build up a deck from almost nothing.  This game has proven very accessible to mild gamers, it saw a lot of play the first weekend.

The Downfall of Pompeii – This game has a great theme.  First you are placing your people into the walled city of Pompeii, then Mount Vesuvius erupts and you try to get out, at the same time causing lava flows that kill your opponents.

Age of Gods – I’ve had this game for a while and not played it.  It’s quite fiddly to set up, but plays quite easily.  Likely targets teenage boys ideally.  It was reasonably fun and short to play.

Portobello Market (x 2)– This is another game I’ve owned for quite some time but not played.  It’s very short to play, and ultimately a multiplayer abstract with a glossy theme of setting up stalls at a market.

Goldbraü (x 2) – Yet another game I’ve owned for a while and hadn’t played.  And this one with a theme of controlling breweries and beer gardens.  A stock ownership and area control combination.  This one was released in 2004, maxes out at 4 players, and takes about an hour.

Traders of Carthage – I bought this game from Z-Man on the last day of the Con last year.  It is a 4-player card game with a small board.  Shipping goods without being pirated.  It does a great job of using the one deck of cards for multiple purposes throughout the game.

Lost Cities – A two-player card game, stereo-typed as “accessible to females”.  It’s a good short game.  Another Knizia.  The 50th game to make it into the BoardGameGeek.com database, and ranked at 132.

Glory to Rome – Another card game that plays like a board game.  Also another game that puts the cards to different uses depending on how they are played in the game.  I played a LOT of this game at Lone Star Con last NYE.  It’s fun and quite variable.  It does take a while to grok all the possible uses of the cards.  The general theme is to build buildings in Rome, each giving you more abilities.  We played this with west coast friends we met at the Con two years ago: Miguel and Paul.

Power Struggle – This was a new Essen 2009 release this year and was in the Hot Games room.  It was still opaque to me when I was finished – i’m not sure what kind of strategy to use in this one.  I enjoyed it; it has an interesting interaction; and game/resource engine; but i’m still a bit apathetic towards it.  I would certainly play it again to try to get a better feel.  This was my first Thursday game.

FITS – A 2009 Knizia release, this is a pattern filling abstract game, a wee tetris-like.  Everyone plays independently, scoring against others.  There was a lot of buzz on this one.  I enjoyed it, but don’t feel it has a lot of replay for me.  However it’s reasonably short, so I wouldn’t turn it down if someone wanted to play.

CirKis (x 2) – I was very excited to see this game.  It’s a (Hasbro) block-laying game with similar design components as Blokus.  The use of Penrose tiles is what so interested.  I’ve always wanted to have a game (or design a game) that used this two shapes that tile the plane only asymmetrically.  (Actually, one of my two unimplemented art car designs employs these shapes.  If I ever pull the trigger on that one, it will have to have this game in it!)  Our 3-player game was totally broken.  I’m not sure if it was a game problem or a player problem.  Likely some of both.  The 4-person play was okay.

Arimaa – This was the most mind challenging game of the weekend.  It’s a two-player abstract that can be played with a chess board.  It does however have its own game implementation if you want to buy a copy.  8 cats, 2 rabbits, 2 dogs, 2 horses, 1 camel, 1 elephant.  All move the same: adjacent orthogonal.  But you get 4 moves per turn and can push or pull weaker opponents.  It was designed as a tougher computing problem than Chess.  And it is.

Alhambra – There was a tournament, but I did poorly in the first round and was out.  In this tile-laying game, you purchase different building types for your personal city on 4 different markets.  This one’s been around since 2003.

DiXit (x 2) – When I saw this game I knew I’d play it.  The cards contain quite bizarre paintings.  Considered a party game, you could also call it an “activity”, but there is scoring.  Make up a sentence about your image, but not so close that you’ll have everyone guessing your vs. the ones everyone tossed in.  A bit of a Apples to Apples feel, but for imaginative adults.

Eketorp – A viking themed game where you build a fortification while others try to knock it down.  An interesting mechanism where a lost warrior goes to the “field hospital” and take a variable number of turns to return to your use depending on how poorly he lost.  This game was released in 2002 and was in the library unpunched.  I enjoyed it.

Nefertiti – An interesting auction game with several markets and different and changing bid mechanisms.  I enjoyed it, but didn’t win it.  I played this game (and many others) with some Jr High/High School friends Manuel and Kevin, as well as with TG.  She didn’t mind the bidding mechanism on this one as much as Ra.

BasketBoss – New from Essen this year, an amazingly light themed game with quite an interesting mechanism beneath.  Managing a basketball team, buying player, bidding on support personnel (Trainer, Referee, Agent).  Teams are ranked each season.  This one seems very accessible to the non-gamer or new-gamer.

You Robot – Seemed like it could be a good game, but as Peter put it “more frustrating than silly”, you attempt to get your partner to get into the position of the robot on the card using only three direction cards and pointing at them.  It would play best if all the clue givers left the room, discussed the position, and if there was a judge in on it to confirm when positions were achieved and that players weren’t otherwise coaching.  It might be fun with kids, supervised, with rules adjusted as needed.

a la Carte – Listed as a 1989 design, was part of the class of 2009 at Essen.  It was verging on Hit Game status at the Con.  It’s hard not to be with it’s fun components.  Some dexterity desirable, but dexterity isn’t necessary helpful.  Making recipes, shaking the right amount of components out of the bottles they’re contained in: too much is bad.  It’s definitely fun, and is a great family game.

Agricola – Two years ago this was the huge game, but with 100s of cards, and a limited supply of German-only games available (and the required paste-up needed), I didn’t play it until last year.  It’s a fun game, and once we got through the laborious setup I remembered why it was worth it.  This was the game people went overboard on before they went overboard on Dominion.

Twilight Struggle – I got this game as my free game after registration.  Mark found out and had to play me (with the copy he brought).  He’s a lover of the game, and I’d only played once before, so it didn’t last too long.  This is a two-player card event-drive game, Cold War US v USSR. (A precursor to 1960: The Making of the President and Campaign Manager 2008)

Cartegena – I picked this one, blind, off the library shelf.  It is a simple racing game of getting your 6 pirates out of prison via a tunnel before anyone else.  It’s simple and could be played with small children.  We played it open handed and open draw pile to make it more strategic.  There is one mechanic that could be considered broken, so the game was redesigned and re-released.  So, I had to chase that one down in the library too.  General consensus was that the first game with one tweak would have done the job.

Ubongo 3D – A 2-cube deep version of the 2-D original.  A 2009 Essen game, it was entirely in German, so I’m not sure how the scoring works, but I came across a couple trying out the timing portion of the game.  It was hard.  Very hard.  Not sure how the game might be modified to handle that, not being able to read the rules.

Tumblin-Dice (x 2) – A classic.  Play this every year.  This is a must have for a game room, and would be an awesome bar game.  Rolling dice down a cascade of increasing multiplyer levels without them falling off.  If you’re an amateur wood worker you could definitely make your own.

Colonia – An Essen 2009 Hot Game that is pure Euro.  A limited number of men to perform an action with, including: choosing first player, buying resources at market, generating goods from resources, shipping resources for money, buying relics (victory points) for money.  With voting at three phases each turn.

Njet! – To me, nyet has always been spelled with a y, when not in Cyrillic.  A trick-taking game that starts by determining how you’re not going to play.  Who picks their partner? What’s trump? What’s super-trump? How many cards are discarded? What is the score for this hand multiplied by?  It played okay with 3, but needs to have a fair number of hands to even out.

Cartegena II – I missed it in the library because the box doesn’t say “2″ on most of the sides.  The additional rules made quite a few modifications, mostly just making for more rules and not a better game.  But, a different game.

Snow Tails – A great theme and mechanism for a racing game, the strength of dogs on either side of your sled will cause it to slide one way or the other.

Game Show (Family Feud) – For the third time, we played the game show, which was very good this year and Family Feud Themed.  TEAM AWESOME!!!!! came in third to last, but had a great time.

Nanuk – This is a 5-8 player game, and plays better the more players there are.  I played it 8-player with one of the designers (Mark).  It’s a good game for larger numbers and can be expanded in length and scored to be more equitable.  The short version is almost random, and would certainly need experienced players to be fair.  This was a new release just available.

Ubongo – Speed laying shapes.  I don’t like the scoring track on this one at all.  I dislike most games with speed elements.

Ubongo Extreme –  This is done with multi-hex shapes rather than multi-square shapes.  Much harder.

duck! duck! SAFARI! – We were lucky enough to have the designer Kevin teach us this one late night on Saturday.  There are 5 games within this one, and he suggested Hi-Lo Hijinks.  I enjoyed it, though there was some initial confusion.  Beer and wine were involved.

Sorry! Sliders – Paul and I stayed up late and played all the variety of games this one provides.  It’s basically a shuffleboard variant.  This won best Family Game at the Con, and that’s easy to see.  Kids like knocking stuff into other stuff, and so did we.

Robber Knights – I haven’t played this, yet, but got a free copy from Queen Games at the Con.

• play board games
• watch televised football
• play pick-up football with the kids
• put up your holiday decorations
• work in the yard
• go for a nice walk

instead of shopping.  I’m lusting for a new iPod touch, but I won’t be buying it.

The original subtext of racism and holocaust has been replaced with one of terrorism.

However the writing, and perhaps only having 4 hours of shows before the winter recess, caused the freight train of plot to overspeed the rails in the first episode out.  Also forcing the “Pilot” into a one hour slot, makes this problematic.  Are they trying to set the whole scene in this one episode?  Seems so.  Or are they just trying to pack more action in?  [Plenty of Spoilers]

0:00 – Erie music and cutting between all the characters to introduce, the first 8 minutes are textbook writing and editing, a very good job.  With requisite action: plane crash, space ship appearance, brief motorcycle hijinx.  Requisite Independence Day joke.

Erica (single mom), Tyler (son) - Father Jack, Roy - Ryan (perhaps fiance), Valerie - Chad (newsman), Anna (visitor)

7:00 – Seemingly within a half hour the military has cordoned off an area and they’re blocking access?  Why?  How so fast?

9:20 – Why is Anna speaking to the almost uninhabited area near the Egyptian pyramids? (perhaps homage to the original mini series shot that was similar)

9:40 – “There will be more communications with your world’s leaders in the hours to come.”  Never happens.

14:36 – “It’s been three weeks.” This is the anti-Lost in plot terms.  Racing past chances for character development in search of action in the plot.  It becomes obvious that Erica’s FBI partner is behaving suspiciously.

19:15 – Visiting the space ship. Lisa (hottie visitor).  ”Peace Ambassador Program”  Bam, just like that.  Three weeks in.  There would absolutely be protests and push back over “indoctrinating our youth” (see recent Obama address to children).

22:50 – Skeptical Father Jack, I like the character.  But his words from the pulpit don’t come across as anything a priest or minister would say.

25:30 – Bad kid, bad V, bad dad, bad mom.  Bam, character development that could have been an entire episode subplot in 2 clean minutes.

27:00 – Suspicious phone calls to Ryan, suspicious Valerie.  Seems we’re going to reveal Ryan’s back store in episode 1.

28:00 – More suspicious partner.  Could have been more subtle over several episodes, but it’s obviously coming to a head in this episode.

30:30 – Father Jack is lured into the web.

31:30 – Chad doesn’t ask the obvious followup to Anna’s “don’t ask us anything that would paint us in an unflattering light”  . . . “like what?”

33:20 – Erica attends “cell meeting”, thinks it’s a terrorist cell, all will soon be revealed, is there anything left?  Did they decided to reveal all the secrets of the first series in 40 minutes?

37:27 – Universal Health Care – LOL. topical.

40:30 – Erica “kills” her partner.  Wouldn’t an FBA agent be skeptical about what would kill an alien? Ryan’s backstory revealed.

44:45 – Erica and Jack as partners.

If they intended to start where the other left off, then they seem to be on their way.  With a bit of aliens as terrorists in a 9/11 world spin.  I can only hope that succeeding episodes will stop long enough for us to meet the characters.

[Pilot available on iTunes for free and Hulu on Saturday]

I defrosted the shrimp, thought they smelled a little fishy, wasn’t really paying attention, sat down to eat them, thought they were fairly flabby, figured they had been mishandled and were of low quality.  Ate one.  It was a wee rubbery, and as I picked up another, stared at the group of them all, I came to the very late conclusion that they were raw.

So, I cooked them up and ate the rest of them.  Hope I’m still alive tomorrow as this blog post will hit the web.  I’ll let you know how I’m feeling.

Hmm, here’s a list of possibilities: Amnesic shellfish poisoning (ASP), Neurotoxic shellfish poisoning (NSP), Diarrhetic shellfish poisoning (DSP),  and Paralytic shellfish poisoning (PSP).  Here’s hoping I don’t become familiar with any of those!

I recently finished watching the two seasons of Dead Like Me on Hulu.  That show started in 2003, and has been likened to The Lovely Bones because the main character is a young girl who dies and continues to watch over her family.  It differs in that the main character is living an afterlife as a grim reaper rather than just watching over the family.  The Showtime broadcast of Dead Like Me was quite good, particularly because they weren’t limited in their language by US broadcast television standards.

Now there is a movie adaptation of The Lovely Bones in post production, directed by Peter Jackson (of Lord of the Rings) no less.  With that in the collective consciousness, this new ABC series presents itself.

The main character in The Forgotten is played by Christian Slater.  The role is a much better one than his last: My Own Worst Enemy, which started repeating itself in the second episode and luckily didn’t make it past nine episodes.  It’s also available on Hulu, please don’t waste your time.

The pilot was done well, but I think it could have dropped most of the partial narration by the dead girl.  It almost comes off as a clash of two stories.  Are we trying to tell the stories of the volunteers searching for the identities or are we there to hear the story of the dead?  I’m also wondering how many of the public will liken next January’s movie to the series that started this September.

More particularly, how many Americans are opinionated on the “against” side and listen to talk radio or any other conservative media and didn’t listen?

I listened to most of President G. W. Bush’s addresses. I very often disagreed with him, but I received the unfiltered message he was delivering.

How many Americans will continue to fight against change yet listen only to one side of the debate? (To call it a debate is questionable.) And how many will continue to fight against invisible ghosts? They’re being riled up against something that doesn’t exist and they’re in such a ferver they don’t hear rational people trying to explain the debate to them.

I hope it succeeds in getting things moving.