Order 67!

Didn't have a darn thing to say yesterday, so I didn't. It be like that sometimes.

Today I got the pattented "Con Review" email that many of us get from our friend Leslie after she returns home from a great Sci-Fi, Fantasy or Horror convention that is out of town and the rest of us are too poverty stricken to get to. This time around she was lucky enough to go to the Star Wars Celebration III (or C3 as it will hence be known as in the Blog of Geekdom) in Indy. I love it when I get these emails so that I can live vicariously through her. But who I would have loved to live vicariously through was her friend, Eric, who got to spend 4 hours with blue Twilik Jedi actress Amy Allen being her leaison for half a day! I don't think he had any idea of how lucky he was. Leslie also sent along some fun pics of some of the costumes she and other people wore there. Very cool.

The only part of the review of the con that left me with a bad taste in my mouth was her comment about "I can see why GenCon left Milwaukee...yada, yada, yada". Long story made quick... GenCon was a fantasy gaming con here in Wisconsin (mostly in Milwaukee over the years) that was bought out, uprooted, moved from it's home of here in Milwaukee and taken to Indy all in the name of greed and big business. GenCon became a company more than a convention (more machine than man now) that runs all of thier cons in Indy, including C3, and is now all about money and bad security guards. It is for that reason that I use my power as Grand Emperor of the galaxy to invoke "Order 67" (that's one up from "Order 66", don't ya know.) Which is to declare members of the big business mentallity as enemies of the Empire and to be hunted down like the DOGS THEY ARE, and further more..... eh... um... I'm in my "damn dream world" again, aren't I? I thought I'd forget to take the meds today.

Sooooo... on to nicer subjects (...says Zangz, hoping nobody noticed his sudden outburst and subsequent drooling).

I didn't read all of it, but it appears that fellow fan-boy turned famed writter / director, Kevin Smith, has posted a review of Ep.III on his website at veiwaskew.com. I didn't read all of it 'cuase the thing is dripping moist with spoilers (and curse words... cool!) that not even I, a spoiler junkie, knew about. After I stopped reading due to the spoilers (Not the curse words.) I was able to surmize that this SW movie is the one that will silence all the naysayers (like my friend Spanky). This puppy is supposed to be way darker then even Ep.V ("Empire") and it sounds like many body parts are light sabered off of characters in thsi one! In general, he seemed estaticly happy with the results. Just one more reason to jones over the coming May 18th midnight showing!!! Dearest Lord, why can't you just speed up time for us puny Star Wars geeks, just this once, you sadistic bastage!!!!

Jeeze. I really do gotta go and take my meds now.

Zangz

The SW cash cow continues on.... Thank God!

Well, the word is out from C3 that Lucas palns to do a Star Wars TV series that would be set between Ep.III and Ep.IV and would feature at least one peripheral character from the SW movies. Don't expect to see anything on the air for at least another year. Lucas wants to have the first season completely written before they start shooting anything.

You had to know that Lucas wouldn't let this money tree of pure geek heaven be uprooted after the release of the last film, would you? Heck, call me a capitalist bastage, but I'd suck out as much marrow and blood from a cash cow that I created also. People may point the figure at him for being "greedy", but any of these same finger pointers would do the same darn thing if they were in the shoes of The Flanneled One. So there will still be SW stuff to geek over well after Ep.III is out of the theaters and out on DVD!

"24" is on tonight, so I'll be getting my weekly series of phone calls from my friend Spanky as the show airs. It's kind of girlish, but we have some good chuckles predicting what will take place after the comercial break. I'm still holding on for that Chloe / Michelle mud wrestling scene that I wrote out and sent to the shows writers, but Spanky doesn't see it happening this season. My fingers are crossed.

And speaking of "24".... there are 24 more days until Ep.III, BABY!

Well, that's about as geeky as I feel like getting today. We'll talk soon.

Zangz

Darth Malak is my Beeeeotch...

Here's a quickie.

Today was a very Star Wars-esque day. I went over to my Mom's to do some wash and get a free dinner. I lugged over my Xbox and finished the game "Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic" or KOTOR for short. After that, I happend to find out the "Star Wars, Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back" (you know I'm a geek when I use the full title!) was on FOX this afternoon. So I was in Star Wars Geek heaven today.

If anyone out there is wondering just how the heck you beat the final boss, Malak, at the end of KOTOR, just make sure you have a ton of med-packs and some form of ofensive force power that you can blast at the imprisioned jedi before Malak can use their energy to strengthen himself. You'll also have to do a fair amount of running around to avoid Malak as your Force Power grows back to normal after using it up fighting and defending against him and.... oh god, I really am going to die alone.

The Passover meal I went to last night was a lot of fun and very interesting. Much wine was imbibed. Good times!

On that note, I'm hitting the hay. It's been a nice 4 day weekend for me and I want to be mentally prepared for Monday.

Zangz

My day of being Hebrew.....

Went out last night with my old friend, Goof and his wife, who're visiting from Virginia this weekend. Tonight I'm going over to his family's home for a Passover meal. Goof did prepare me that this experience is quite intricate and that there are many parts to it. It's not exactally a sit-down meal like Thanksgiving or Xmas. It is very involved and there is lots of food, prayer and talk and can last a few hours. Hey, this gentile is up for anything. Once in a while it's to experience other religions. Should be interesting.

Not much other news on the geek-front right now. The only thing I have to gripe about now is how frellin' envious I am of all the Star Wars fans who get to converge on Indianapolis this weekend for Star Wars Celebration 3. This is the BIG convention for SW fans (that have the cash) to rub elbows with many of the cast and crew of the movies. Non other than George Lucas and producer Rick MaCallum (SP?) are there right now giving Q&A seminars and the like. Sadly this will be the last Celebration in the foreseable future due to the fact hat they only have them when they are releasing a new SW movie. If I were indepentantly wealthy, I'd be there!!! Rumor has it the majority of your time spent at the convention is standing in very long lines for several hours to get to see whatever Q&A session you want to. My friend Leslie is there now and I'm really hoping she'll give one of her famous, in-depth reports with pictures when she returns. She still owes me some pix of the lovely Claudia Black from Leslie's visit to the Farscape convention late last year. Ehem...Ehem, Leslie?

This morning I was watching some TV, lying on the couch, channel suffing and I came accross this "American Idol" clone called "Nashville Star". Now I'm not exactally the biggest country music fan (heck I'm listening to a little Love/Hate at top vollum right now as I type this. Yep...Playlist!) but, I couldn't stop watching it. Maybe it was the down-home friendliness of the contestants, maybe it was the excellent tallent that came through on stage with each and every contestant. More than likely it was the fact that every female on that frellin' show was incredibly gorgeous in one way or antother. Even the female judge who had the "Simon" roll, was quite an incredible vision. Maybe I should start thinking about moving to Nashville to find my significant other. Hmmmm...

That's about it for now.
Zangz

The Power of Completely Useless Knowledge....

Since I had off today I did some cleaning of Zangz's Headquarters, went grocery shopping, played a little "Fable" on the Xbox and watched the documentary on the making of the original Star Wars trilogy. Here's some completely useless information you may want to know...

Did you know that Terry Nunn (lead vocalist from 80's synth-pop band Berlin) read for the role of Princess Lea and that William Cat (from the 80's action adventure show "Greatest American Hero") read for Luke and that Kurt Russell read for Han Solo. Even more useless of knowledge is the fact that actor Perry King also read for the role of Han Solo. Though he didn't get the part, years later he would be the voice of Han Solo in the radio adaptation of the movies. Now you're all 0.1 % smarter than you were before you read this blog. See you can actually benefit visiting my Blog of Geekdom from time to time.

Outside of still being giddy over getting tix to the Gigantor-screen's midnight showing of Ep.III (which sold completely out!) there's not much else to talk about here today.

Talk to you soon.

Zangz

IT'S ON, BABY! It...Is...On!

Do you folks know what precious good I hold in my little hands right this second? Is it the keys to a brand new sports car? No, better. Is it a $1 million dollar bill? No, better. All right, I'll end the suspense for you.....

It's a 4 person ticket to the MIDNIGHT SHOWING OF "STAR WARS, EPISODE III: REVENGE OF THE SITH AT THE UBER-MEGA-ULTRASCREEN!!!! And I'm wavin' it in your face, foolish mortal.....IN YOUR FACE!!!! IT IS ON, BABY!!! (Imagine a 37 year old nerd jumping up and down, alone in his apartment bedroom waving a freshly printed piece of paper in his hand to no one in particular at 11pm in the evening. After you’re done laughing your ass off, or if you're a relative of his...weeping silently to yourself, please read on).

I was smart enough to get on the website selling the tix about 20 minutes before they were to presumably be on sale and while doing the ol' "refresh, refresh, refresh, refresh" routine. Well they went on sale 10 minutes before I was told they'd be on sale so I clicked away, hit "print ticket" and wallah, me and some friends will be geekin' it up at the midnight showing! THE MIDNIGHT SHOWING, BABY!!! IT IS ON! ON, BABY! ON!!! (more waving, laughing, weeping).

I'm off tomorrow and have some good friends coming into town this weekend. So I'll check with you later. ON, BABY, ON!!
Zangz

The Lamest Blog of Geekdom of All Time!

I really don't have much to say today, except I was really disscombobulated and out of sorts today. Lot's of odd craziness was going on from 11pm last night, right on through the day. So I'm a little out of creative juices right now. At least I have off tomorrow and Friday. Perhaps that's something to cheer me up since I'm starting to realize that my upcoming attemp at scoring Ep. III midnight showing tix is shrinking smaller and smaller and I'll probably end up seeing it at a far later showing, well after all the fun crowds have seen it. More on that tomrrow.

I think I need some Zanex. Anybody got a few.... jars full?
Zangz

One Month to Go!!!!!!!

As of today there are 30 more days until "Star Wars, Episode III: Revenge of the Sith" (yep. I spelled it out that time, just for effect). You may say that a man well into his 30's counting down the days until Ep.III is pretty pathetic. Well, one man's "pathetic" is another man's "kitch".

Still trying to get some info about ticket buying for the presumable midnight show, but it appears that I'm getting different answers from different people. So who knows at this point.

In other news of the world, it looks like we got ourselves a new pope. While Pope John Paul II was a bit moderate (although conservatives thought he was too liberal and liberals considered him too conservative) this new guy, the German Pope Benedict XVI, is supposed to be a real Naz...er... he's supposed to be pretty conservative and not nearly as much as a people person. I guess the cardinals want even more people to flee the Catholic church. Smooth move, fellas!

When I learn more about Ep. III tix, I'll blow white smoke of my... bathroom window for ya.
Zangz

Curse of the Zipperheads.....

A slightly frustrating day today concerning the Ep.III tix. Called up the local theater that we want to see the midnight showing at. For some reason they're changing their policy that they've kept for past Prequel releases. Seems that tix will go on sale on-line first rather than for people who show up in person to purchase their tix at the theater. In the past the big theater chain here in town always gave the people who actually showed up in person at the theater a 2 hour lead in buying tix. In fact the chain is giving people who go to a website that sells tix several hours of a lead before the tix officially go on sale on Friday. I guess money talks. Obviously the big theater chain here in town has some finacial ties to the website in particular. Outside of money, I really don't know why they've decided to play it this way. Theoreticly, someone could just buy up the whole theater in one click if they wanted to, unless there's some sort of limit electronically placed on the website. Another problem that this theater chain is having is that they've yet to announce if there actaully is going to be a midnight showing at any of their theaters. Now, don't you think they'd put that up on thier website at least? There's this wacky thing here in the promotional age called, PLUBLICITY! Why is it that whenever you're dealing with a big business chain, you're automatically dealing with a bunch of greedy ziperheads?

So it looks like the best option right now is to sit online before the appointed time they go on sale and hope to god my slow as dirt, land line connection, doesn't fumble it up.

Stay tuned to this growing concern.
Zangz

Tribute to the King....

- and I was thinking how the world should have cried on the day that Jack Kirby died, I wonder if I am ill, yeaaah. I will never trust myself again, but I don’t care. Just set that plastic soul on fire and watch it MELT! -

That's a great lyric! What does it mean? Heck if I know, but any hard rock band that pays homage to the late comic book artist / god, Jack "the King" Kirby in one their songs definitely gets kudos from Zangz's Blog of Geekdom. It's from Monster Magnet's song "Melt" from their album, "God Says, No". If you've been reading, I've finally discovered the "Playlist" feature on my 5 year old computer and have Monster Magnet's last three albums on my computer, shuffled up nicely so I can sit and cruise the web with up to 3+ hours of Monster Magnet playing along. I've done with another of my favorite bands, Type-O-Negative also.

Today's plans seem to sprout out like this. Go to my mom's and start my wash, then head back to the east side and hit an impromptu birthday party (the second impromptu activity this weekend). Then head back to finish up on the wash and have dinner with Mom, watch some TV and head back home to rest up before Monday hits.

Hope I'll be able to take this coming Friday off if tix to Ep.III do indeed go on sale, 'cause its may look like I could be the one from my group of Ultrascreen, Midnight Showing Enthusiasts to be in line for tix due to other's scheduling situations.

That's it for today.
Zangz