Scuffulans hirsutus

Odds and ends in lieu of a substantative post.

My ankle has healed to the point that it’s a minor nuisance, not a major problem. It doesn’t feel right, and I expect that it never really will, but I can get around plenty well now, up and down stairs and out on my bicycle. I’m done with formal physical therapy. Next month I plan to take a beginning ballet class as a form of advanced PT. I don’t expect to be back on the dance stage again — my ankle is getting better, but my knees aren’t — but taking class will be worthwhile just to demonstrate to myself that I can still do it, despite everything.

*****

I’ve installed a new photo gallery that I hope will be easier to upgrade in the future when it becomes necessary. I’m in the process of uploading the pictures from the old site. There are a bunch of them, and it’s going to take a while to post them all. Currently, there are some pictures from last year’s Walnut Valley Festival, some from the local botanical garden, and a selection of pictures from my days in the Society for Creative Anachronism. The last are mostly black and white and date back to when I worked in an old-fashioned chemical darkroom.

*****

Robert the LLama Butcher, one of my favorite bloggers, has his own place now, The Port Stands at Your Elbow. He promises to keep posting at the old site as well.

*****

Watchmen is one of the very few comic books graphic novels that I have read. The inevitable movie is due out next year, and it looks like it might not be a botch — though it almost was:

… they originally wanted Keanu Reeves for Dr. Manhattan, Ron Perlman for The Comedian, and either Jude Law and Tom Cruise for Ozymandias. Gack!

Toren makes an essential point in the comments there:

Alan has put his money where his mouth is and transferred all his share of the profits from the movie to Dave Gibbons, the artist. I’ve met Dave a few times here and in England and I must say he’s not only a great guy but his work in adapting Alan’s brutally difficult script has been vastly underrated. To take Alan’s insanely complex and dense scripts and adapt them to read fluently and yet contain the unbelievable amount of required detail and foreshadowing is one of comic’s great accomplishments. Dave’s work was hugely appreciated within the industry but alas, never got much credit outside of it. It was all “Alan Moore is God.”

It’s a damn shame.

Alan Moore isn’t God, but is he Shakespeare? Eve Tushnet has some interesting things to say about Watchmen (spoilers), finding parallels with Measure for Measure and much else. (You may need to scroll down to the entries for January 23, 2004.) Scroll up for additional comments and links.

Update: More on Moore from Tushnet.

It’s probably going to be close to two months before I can photograph ballet again. (The doctor says the bones are healing “perfectly,” but bones and ligaments take time, lots of time.) If you miss the pictures of dancers, visit Bill Luse’s page.

Shamus Young is the most dangerous sort of guy, with lots of ideas and the time and energy to implement them. He first came to my attention several years ago with The Lemon. Later there was The DM of the Rings. Currently he is one of the parties responsible for Chainmail Bikini. His most recent effort is a WordPress plugin, “Wavatars,” which I’ve installed here. If you leave a comment, your name will be accompanied by an eighty-pixel-square avatar determined by your email address. (If you have a Gravatar, as I do, that’s what you will see instead.) On a weblog like mine where comments are infrequent, these are just a cute novelty, but on sites where comment threads get lengthy, these could be useful for keeping the various writers straight.

If you like the idea but want something a little more macabre for your own site, consider MonsterID. (Via Aziz.)

Congratulations to the LLamas, who turn five today.

Congratulations also to Angus and Sarah.

Final Fantasy A+ (Via Shamus).

One way to handle a telemarketer (Via Ken the Brickmuppet).

I found a website that makes Flash jigsaw puzzles from pictures on your computer. There’s one made from one of my photos below the fold.

Update: A memory from my days in the SCA that I’d like to forget.
(more…)

… yet again. John Salmon, that is.

Fred’s current exercise is writing the openings to SF stories. The first one is here. They get worse, or better, depending on how you reckon such things.

On a very different note, here’a a haiku, courtesy of dylan, who recently celebrated the fifth anniversary of his weblog’s inception.

The DM of the Rings reached its not-exactly-epic conclusion today. Shamus is now at work on another comic, Chainmail Bikini. Enjoy it now before the DRM kicks in.

An unexpected Star Trek fan.

*****

I didn’t much care for Peter Jackson’s version of The Lord of the Rings, but it did make The DM of the Rings possible. Shamus is about to wrap the story up. It begins here. Shamus’ next project will be here.

*****

The first tune I heard Saturday morning was “Wipeout.” I also heard “American Pie,” some Jethro Tull and an a capella rendition of the riff from “Smoke on the Water.” Where was I?

(more…)

Spy style. Shamus tells you how.

I was flattered yesterday to find that Mark Sullivan named Scuffulans hirsutus as a “thoughtful blog.” I was also a little surprised. I’ve retired from the thinking business, and nowadays I mostly just take pictures, pretty and otherwise. (There may be more music in the future, but thoughts will probably remain rare and fragmentary.)

The rules:

1. If, and only if, you get tagged, write a post with links to 5 blogs that make you think,
2. Link to this post so that people can easily find the exact origin of the meme,
3. Optional: Proudly display the ‘Thinking Blogger Award’ with a link to the post that you wrote…

This particular game started back in February, and probably every weblog that has provoked any thoughts anywhere has already been recognized. Nevertheless, I’ll list five deserving sites just in case any have been overlooked.

Aliens in This World — everything from the motu proprio to Megatokyo.

Dyspeptic Mutterings — the art of the fisk, Byzantium, and science fiction, too.

Eve Tushnet — if there ever was an insightful blogger, it’s Eve.

Total Dick-Head — i.e., Philip K. Dick.

Video meliora, proboque; Deteriora sequor — reflections on literature, life and Catholicism.

Kashi, alias the invisible CapnFlynn, artist and animator, formerly the proprietress of Synonyms and Sugar (one of the ten best-named weblogs ever), has illustrated a book, The Voyage to Ruin, by H.L. Trombley. According to the website,

For the sinking of her ship and the death of her lover, pirate Captain Franceline Drake seeks revenge on Captain Acheron Zeal of Her Majesty’s Navy. For her most terrible crimes against the ships of Camembert, Zeal pursues Drake across the seas and skies of the Quadra Terrarum. And in the midst of the intrigue and mystery, the fate of a man named Flynn Freeborn will follow in their wake.

If you think you’d might enjoy a “pirate adventure fantasy,” check it out. There’s further information here.

I’m happy to note that a couple of long-absent bloggers are posting again: the Bookish Gardener and the Jelly-Pinched Wolf.