Yeah, I’m clueless about these things…

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Okay. So.

Theoretically speaking…

Suppose there was a certain science fiction television show that I was interested in watching (ahem). Also suppose that not only do I not presently subscribe to cable, but I have no intention of doing so, as the amount of time I’d spend watching television in no way justifies the cost.

Now, in theory, it’s supposed to be possible for me to go out onto the ‘net somewhere to find digitized copies of the episodes that I could download and then watch on my computer.

How in the world would I go about this? Where would I look?

Would I need any special software (Mac OS X software, please)?

Any and all advice, hints, or pointers would be greatly appreciated.

iTunes “Skin (Keith Litman)” by Charlotte from the album DJ Mix 2000 (1998, 4:00).

Battlestar Galactica Episode 1

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This is incredibly cool: The Sci-Fi Channel has posted the first episode of Battlestar Galactica season one (not the miniseries that’s currently available on DVD, but the currently-running TV series) on their website, free, uncut, and without commercials.

Just go to the Battlestar Galactica site and click on the banner at the top of the page. You’ll need RealPlayer, unfortunately, but that’s the only downside I can see.

I know what I’m watching when I get home from work tonight.

(via /.)

iTunes “Black Flys pres. Club Flys 1 (full mix)” by Various Artists from the album Black Flys pres. Club Flys 1 (full mix) (1997, 1:13:16).

Now with Markdown

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I’ve just added John Gruber‘s excellent text-processing plugin Markdown to the site, and enabled it for comments as well as for my own use when writing posts.

In short, this means that any of you that are familiar with Markdown’s syntax can now use that when entering your comments, and they will appear on the site properly formatted.

Those of you unfamiliar with Markdown can just type normally, using HTML if you want.

Those of you unfamiliar with HTML can just type your little hearts out. :)

A very brief summary of Markdown’s most common syntax patterns follows behind the cut…

Read more

Hunter S. Thompson

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Seeing all the many varied reports of Hunter S. Thompson‘s unfortunate demise reminds me that I’ve actually never read any of his work.

I’m a big fan of the Terry Gilliam/Johnny Depp film adaptation of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, and I also have a great 3 of the book. I even used to have a hardbound copy of Fear and Loathing — unfortunately, the only times I opened it were during one ill-considered period where it was a convenient (and seemingly appropriate) place to hide the sheet of acid I was in the process of selling. I may still have the book buried somewhere in my boxes, but I’m not entirely sure.

So, then, a question for those more familiar with Thompson’s work than I am: while Fear and Loathing seems to be practically the only book that ever gets mentioned when eulogizing Thompson, I’m sure he wrote more than that one tome. Any recommendations? Should I pick Fear and Loathing up (or dig through my boxes to see if I can find it), or are there other books that I should search out instead/in addition to that one?

iTunes “Say Hello” by Anderson, Laurie from the album United States Live (1984, 5:01).

Jim Steinman

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A few years ago, the radio at work was tuned into one of the Anchorage “adult contemporary” stations — brainless background work-safe music that I wasn’t really paying much attention to. One song came on that caught my ear, so I stopped to take a closer listen to it. I had no idea what it was or who was singing, but the more I listened to it, the more a certain suspicion grew.

So I called up the radio station.

“Mix 103.1, what can I do for you?”

“I just need to know what the song you just played was — but before you tell me, I want you to check something out for me. By any chance was that song written or produced by Jim Steinman?”

“What? I haven’t got a clue.”

“Could you check?”

“Um…sure, hold on.” The DJ must have thought that I was nuts. A moment later, he got back on the phone. “Actually, yeah, you’re right. Written and produced by Jim Steinman. How did you know that?”

I laughed. “It just sounded like him. He’s the guy who wrote and produced both of Meat Loaf‘s big albums, Bat out of Hell and Bat out of Hell II: Back into Hell. Whatever that song was, it sounded like a Meat Loaf song, only it was someone else singing, so I figured it was probably Steinman.”

“Not bad.”

“Thanks. So who was it?”

“Celine Dion. It’s All Coming Back To Me Now.”

“Oh. Crap, I just liked a Celine Dion song?”

(Sigh.)

So, yeah. There’s one Celine Dion song that I do have to admit to liking. In my defense, though, it has nothing to do with Celine — it’s all about Jim Steinman. Overproduced, bombastic, and very often tongue-in-cheek rock and roll. I love it when Meatloaf’s singing it, and I even like it when Celine’s singing it.

Just another addition to my many guilty pleasures.

(This confession inspired by a MeFi pointer to this list of parody Steinman song titles, which isn’t really as amusing as I’d hoped it would be.)

iTunes “You Took the Words Right Out of My Mouth (Hot Summer Night)” by Meat Loaf from the album Bat Out of Hell (1977, 5:05).

Kubrickr

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Here’s a nifty toy for all you WordPress users that have recently updated to v1.5 and are using the default ‘Kubrick‘ theme: Kubrickr. Given a tag, it will search Flickr for all licensed photos with that tag and then allow you to crop the photo down to create a replacement header graphic that drops right into the Kubrick layout.

Quite nifty, and given that there’s something of a glut of Kubrick-themed sites right now (don’t get me wrong, it’s a nice template…I should know, I’ve seen it often enough), this should help ease the monotony a bit.

(via Matt)

iTunes “Dead Souls (Live)” by Nine Inch Nails from the album Familiar Sting (1994, 6:15).

Full-time blogging

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I’ve got to admit, I wish I could ‘pull a kottke’ and move to blogging as a ‘job’. The idea has a lot of appeal. Unfortunately, I’m in no shape financially to do such a thing, and I don’t have the wide readership that he has that would allow me to request donations (which, I’ll admit, I’d likely have a few reservations about, though not as strongly as Greg does).

Still…a guy can dream, right? ;)