The Patent Dragon's Zone of Soul Retraction

Yay, it's comic delivery time again, and some pretty major events are either continuing or winding up, as I shall now report...

( WARNING! High levels of spoiler contamination ahead! )

Meanwhile, more little snippets are getting out about the Guardians Of The Galaxy movie, and there seems to be a concerted effort to talk up the whole project, whilst keeping as many of its secrets as possible. I am still firmly behind this movie, and I cannot see Marvel Studios dropping the ball after SEVEN movies and a TV series. It's going to work - trust me on this - and "I am Groot" will be the catchphrase of next summer.

(...make that expired...)

And on the same day as "The White Skull" "quits", Geoff Johns calls an end to his run on Green Lantern - a greater reason for world-wide sorrow...?

Oh, here's a "nugget" for you: doctors keep getting condemned by the "religious" for "playing God", yet they went ahead and implanted a pacemaker in "The Holy Father". Oh, right - it's only wrong for everyone who isn't some kind of religious fundamentalist in a dress!

Here's Something... Could Saints Row The Third be next on the shopping list? It certainly looks like a whole bunch of fun, in a Carmageddon meets Duke Nukem kind of groove...

( Video embedded, with violence and rude words... )

Gods, my sleep patterns are messed up... guess Civilization V until 4 in the morning isn't such a great idea. So, what else happened (apart from once again missing part of South Park's "Cartoon Wars")...?

Comics? Check! The parcel was waiting for me when I got home, and included the conclusion of Avengers vs X-Men (it was okay, and might perhaps be viewed better as a spring-board for what comes next than a milestone limited series - now let's hope (heh) Marvel will leave off the events for a while) and the introduction of the new, and somewhat controversial American Muslim Green Lantern (this is actually the most I've enjoyed post "New 52" GL, and I really hope they're not bringing in this new character only to have him die, heroically or otherwise, in the "Rise Of The Third Army" storyline that's just beginning).

Investments? Not quite a Check. Official stuff has changed, in only the space of a couple of weeks, that has forced me to rethink my plans. Terrific. A "second best" option now seems to be all that's feasible right now.

I could probably think up other stuff - like the office painting that was apparently completed this morning - but I would rather like to finish this in time for going to bed at a sensible time.

One day to X-COM: Enemy Unknown...

- 16th June 2011 -

An 0600 start, and a big, busy day. Barely enough time to think, let alone relax!

( Continues... )


- 17th June 2011 -

No rest for the wicked. Awake an hour before I needed to be, then back to "WIB" (Where I Began) for an all-out assault on the attic, where things - and memories - have been sequestered for decades. Big Bro needs to relocate his collection...

( Continues... )


- 18th June 2011 -

Oh (insert stream of particularly vivid profanity here).

( Continues... )

Movie Review - GREEN LANTERN... Marvel have been dominating the superhero movie stakes these last few years, with only The Dark Knight appearing for "The Distinguished Competition" (as Stan Lee would put it). On Friday, DC went along the THOR route, and launched a property the general public might not be familiar with: Green Lantern...

( ...and this is how it goes - complete with SPOILERS... )

The Final Word... A solid beginning for a character with franchise potential. Maybe not as awe-inspiring as THOR, and the effects aren't always entirely up to the task, but a brave effort by DC to try and catch up in the superhero movie stakes. 8/10


- 19th June 2011 -

Yesterday was the "day of rest". Today, reducing and rationalising the attic contents, and the last few things from "WIB". Plenty to do, some of it done - and more to come, but not tomorrow. Monday, I go back to work (for a day), and see what's happening - and maybe even get a 'net connection!

Highlight of the day - a proper cooked meal, and not the crap I've been eating the last few days. Even so, I'm certain I've lost some weight in the past week or so...

These are simultaneously going to be the longest and shortest three weeks of my life...

We have a Move date.

Parts of the house are already looking bare, and I've simply got to say it: it freaks me out. It's... it's like walking into a hotel room, not part of the house you've spent all your life in. Maybe that's the way it's supposed to work; a "soft disconnect" rather than a wrench - but I wouldn't know anything about that.

I'm going to try and get the current piece of writing completed ASAP, then there's a distinct possibility of some involuntary "down-time". I'll have a whole new writing environment to sort out, and adjust to...

The day after will be opening day for Green Lantern. The perfect opportunity for a huge "de-freak-out" session, I'm thinking. VIP seats, here I come.

Okay, now I'm pissed. The ear-drops I've been using received reporachful looks and shakes of the head when I went to make an appointment to get the wax professionally dislodged. These were, oddly enough, drops given to me on prescription last time I needed this done - and the drops that made an existing problem a great deal worse at the weekend...

My appointment is almost a whole week after Operation Rush Hour, so it simply won't help. I have resorted to The Market Leading Product for the problem, and already, it's making a difference. Hopefully, the treatement cycle will see me back to normal before Saturday.

Development News... Progress is rather "stop 'n' go" on TDD-701 "A Star Is Rising", and that shouldn't be much of a surprise, giving that I'm "auditioning" several new characters who're coming to the fore as "the new order" starts to settle into place, over the "trilogy" of TDD-700 "After The Fall", TDD-701 and TDD-702 title tbc - or at least that's the plan I just came up with...

And Then... Holy crap! Last night, we got our first Green Lantern TV trailer! Guess Warner Bros don't want to rest on their Happy Potter final chapter laurels after all...

It's a bit weird today - I'm still energised by yesterday, but when I sit down, boy am I tired. THOR gets a full big-screen week starting Friday, so I might just go and see it again on my birthday... :)

The Weekend Of Madness may be over, but where to go from here? There are certainly a good crop of blockbusters still to come, but what else can I cram into the summer? Are we looking at a Summer Of Madness?

I have craft things in mind - I made a set of Emotional Spectrum "prayer beads" in preparation for Green Lantern (June 17), and there is still a couple of Mission tasks along those lines...

51 - Create something to sell, and sell it!
52 - Complete some craft projects I've started
84 - Learn to make my own paper...
85 - ...and make my own books!
91 - Create a "personal goddess"
94 - Make a PD-worthy pair of boots from scratch!
97 - Build a diddley bow

Still got Rush in three weeks, remember (Task 90)... oh, and no CLAN to fanny things up!

Development News... There's every chance I might just have TDD-701: After The Fall finished before REIGNFALL even starts posting! There wasn't a great deal of writing done today - I actually managed to do more yesterday - but progress is progress, and the rest of the story is pretty much writing itself on the scaffolding of pre-planned story threads. A bit more work tonight will push things ahead, maybe even reach completion...

So, what's the story...? Got a bit of lie-in writing done, but no way as much as I'd have liked. Chapter 8 of TDD-612 REIGNFALL continues, but it may not be the penultimate chapter any longer, given that I've only covered one and a half of my "key plays", and the chapter is nearing completion, based on the length of previous chapters. If I'd been sticking to my "shooting schedule", I'd be at "scene 8" of 13 by now...

On My Mind Right Now... Colour me a believer; I've seen new footage from the Green Lantern movie...

( Embedded footage after the BEEEEEP... )

Kinda craps all over the intensively-discussed first trailer. Mark Strong is Sinestro.

Meanwhile... Just why, pray tell, is Joel Veitch's Look At My Potato song stuck in my head right now...?

I get the feeling I've dodged a bullet by not going to "the pictures" tonight. The wind's been roaring most of the day, and Skyline will be showing next week, albeit not on the main screen, 'cause of Potter 7.1... boys and girls, I feel a "double-header" brewing for Saturday.

I have already seen the Green Lantern trailer on the net, but seeing it again on a big screen would be most welcome - which means that, yes, I am planning on going to see ...Deathly Hallows Part 1. J.K. put her £1 million on the wrong horse - her loss - so I'm not so "sore" about handing her a share of my ticket money...

I may need to "skim" the first half of TDH to refresh my memory - I've only read the book once - but I do know one thing; there are two characters who very definitely need a proper send-off, three if you count Dumbledore. My opinions of the more recent movies are less than glowing, but I will give this a fair "hearing" - and review it like I see it.

Anyway... My plan to split Chapter 5 of MoN-205 Flight 102 Is Overdue into two appears to have worked - I've taken one BIG chapter, and converted it into one regular-sized complete chapter (5), and a chapter needing a little expansion (6), the expansion of which has now been all but completed. I'm now clear to begin Part 2 of the story, which has the "sub-title" A Traveller Calls - guess who features in that?

Confirmation of posting plans is imminent. If I manage to make strong progress with Part 2 the rest of this week, Part 1 will most likely start airing on Saturday.

Meanwhile... A future story-"arclet" - one of several due after Season Six concludes - just got a boost, as a "nightmare scenario" came to mind. Ooooh, this could be... interesting, and a big surprise for all involved. And I mean all.

The Student Fees "Protest"... "Demo-lition". Speaks volumes, doesn't it? That's the banner a good deal of these "students" were marching under when they stormed into Conservative Party HQ at Millbank yesterday.

Oh, so it was all down to "anarchists", was it? The University Anarchists Society, perhaps? Let's be honest; this was never going to be a peaceful, civilised protest, and the "rent-a-mob" will be happy for the publicity, as the head of the Students' Union condemns them, then goes home, cracks open a bottle of "Bolly", and toasts them for nearly killing a police officer by throwing a fire extinguisher off the roof of the building.

"Why didn't the police do something?" What, and get pillioried AGAIN 'cause some hippy got a bump on the head, and a police officer happened to be within ten feet of them? If I was working in that building, I'd probably sue both the NUS and the police for the respective action/inaction... and don't anyone give me that "heavy-handed policing" bullsh8 - how heavy-handed can fifteen police officers be when they're pinned against a building by twenty thousand baying "students"?

Don't think for one moment that we've seen the last of this kind of action, 'cause I get the feeling the JobCentres will be next (and that's NOT an incitement to criminal action, MI5 - it's an entirely valid observation)...

( WARNING - rant bomb, enhanced with 'colourful language', ahead! )

Ah, screw all this - I'm starting to hear the Red Lantern oath inside my head...

With blood and rage of crimson red,
Ripped from a corpse so freshly dead,
Together with our hellish hate,
We'll burn you all--That is your fate!

—Atrocitus, Green Lantern (vol. 4) #32 (June 2008)

And finally, this: Mr Nick Clegg, I voted for the Liberal Democrats in May on the basis of what appeared to be an enlightened and positive policy on the unemployment situation - a policy you have ditched for a sniff at power. I will not vote for your gang of scum again.

Rant channel closed.