Maryland Pok Guy

If you spend enough time in Howard County, you are bound to notice the green bumper stickers which implore you to “Choose Civility”.  And who could object?  Civil driving should make life easier for everyone, even those who don’t drive (trust me on this one), right?  And wouldn’t it be better to give someone a tip of the hat because they let you in, as opposed to being flipped off by someone who just cut you off as they crossed twain lanes of traffic to reach an off ramp?  Surely, even in this hat averse day, the former is preferred behavior?  And yet, the bumper stickers mask the ugly reality.  I was recently cut off by someone sporting one of these green bumper stickers who was quite in a hurry to get to a nearby filling station (which, in a fit of karma, was out of gas).  Now, in a way, one might expect this behavior, for you see, the subtext of the bumper sticker reads “In Howard County”.  That is to say, the choice of civility extends only to the Howard County line, over which anything is fair game.  But the aforementioned incident, so cruel to my gentle soul, happened within the county, at least a mile if not more!  Oh, how my county view has been shattered!  Never can I drive these wild streets expecting even a modicum of civility!  The only law of the Howard County roads, apparently, is the law of nature, cut off or be cut off!

you’re at your local Panera in the middle of suburbia (admittedly convenient to the Baltimore-Washington Parkway) and you run across a European couple on vacation.  I’m assuming (and hoping) they were just driving between the major metropolises in the region, but I could be wrong.  Laurel, Maryland may have one hell of a PR department.  But it was pretty cool.  I rarely notice tourists, but then I don’t really live or work near the tourist hotspots.  The real kicker is that they took pictures of themselves in front of the restaurant.  It was kinda… weird…  But, I shouldn’t be too quick to judge, since I think the next time I’m in Japan I’ll get my picture taken in front of a McDonalds.  They’re that good there.

One means by which ancient connections are shown is through place names. Instead of Deutschland we call it Germany, a vestige of the days when England was nothing more than a distant Roman province. And so it is with the Chinese city of Quanzhou. In the Middle Ages it was known to Europeans as Zaitun (or Zaiton), as shown in this map from 1474:

This name came to Europe by way of the Arabs, Quanzhou being the final destination in the sea journey from the Middle East.  Quanzhou was established during the Tang Dynasty, and even in those days one could expect to see Persian, Arab, and nascent Muslim traders plying the waters.  These traders, along with those that came to the Middle Kingdom via the Silk Road, were the progenitors of one of China’s major ethnic groups, the Hui.  During later dynasties Quanzhou would grow to become one of the largest ports in the world, showing the significance of the trade links between China and the Middle East.

You can let out a sigh of relief: the Avatar finale has been viewed, and the search for an equal to fill the void shall commence.  I will admit, I was rather pessimistic.  I have seen strong shows destroyed by their final episodes before.  And the third season of Avatar seemed a little lost, suffering from pacing problems and weaker writing (still better than the vast majority of shows on television, but weaker than the second season).  In the end, it pulled through, and, frankly, I don’t think I could have asked for it any other way.  Granted, I would have liked to have seen the recently crowned Phoenix King Ozai perish as righteousness conquered evil, but given the constraints (it is a kid’s show after all), I think they took him down in the best way possible.  It was a phenomenal ending to a fantastic story.  I love epic tales where the hero must leave the safety of home, sacrificing everything to defeat some great force of evil.  And Avatar pulled it off beautifully.  It is such a rare treat in any medium, but the fact that it was on television makes it all the more astounding, and appreciated by me for my love of visual stimulation and my short attention span.  Hell, mad props to Nickelodeon for actually seeing the project through and not canceling it, to Bryan and Michael for creating the thing, and to Aaron Ehasz for being such a damned good writer.  OK, that last line might be kind of blatant, and lame, fanboy gushing, but I’ll let it stand.  Now time to pre-order the third season DVDs…

This week is shaping up to be a good one.  I get a new Avatar episode every night at 8 PM, finishing up with the series finale on Saturday.  The new Batman movie, looking oh so very bad ass, opens on Friday.  And Saturday I get to play Rock Band with my work peeps.  There’s only that “work” thing I have to get through…  Plus I made a boat load of chili (literally, you could fill a boat with it) tonight, so I have plenty o’ leftovers.  What more could a bearded twenty-something ask for?

Has it been two years already?  My, don’t I sound old talking about how time just flies.  And, yes, I haven’t implemented phase 2.093908234 of ringo, as I promised, oh so many moons ago.  It isn’t that I’m lazy; nothing of the sort!  In fact, it is just soooo awesome, it is taking me over two years to bring this masterpiece to fruition.  For serious reals: it is gonna be awesome.  Let’s see where the next two years takes this blog, shall we?

I’m just going to say it: I loved WALL*E.  It’s a cute story with phenomenal animation.  From the way the lighting changes to the way things rust gives such a high degree of realism that it’s easy to forget you’re watching an animated film.  And who would have thought you could have a successful romantic pairing between two robots?  Seriously?  In comparison to the other computer animated movie I saw this year, Kung Fu Panda, WALL*E blows it out of the water.  It isn’t to say Kung Fu Panda was bad, it was quite entertaining; but in the end it was rather formulaic, and the most impressive animation was the hand drawn sequences at the beginning of the film.  Pixar continues to break the mold with WALL*E, in both story and animation, and that is why I rate it 9.342 Gigafonzies for entertainment.

Also, I loved how WALL*E’s reboot sound was the same as the ol’ Mac boot-up noise.  Thank you, Steve Jobs…

So, I was originally going to write a post about how I was somewhat miffed that the creators of Avatar decided to name a character literally after the word for the sleeve of a Han dynasty style dress, and while using the Mandarin pronunciation for that word to say the name, wrote the character’s name using the Cantonese transliteration.  This is how “Mai” (pronounced like “My”) ends up being pronounced “Mei” (or “May”, if you please).  Then I decided that while such venting may be therapeutic in the short run, it would be far more entertaining to turn my investigative process into the plot of a murder mystery.  I figure it will be set in Victorian England, a roller coaster of a page turner, crammed with sizzling Gypsies (Editor’s note: to anyone who has seen Black Adder, that was what’s called an homage, not plagiarism).

I wrote this in reply to some anonymous urchin accusing some other anonymous urchin of pretending to be a woman to raise the hopes of all the geekanerds surfin’ the tubes of teh interwebs:

 Wimmen, ya sez? I thinks I sarws one of dems once. ’twas the year naught-four. Aye, she were four-and-twenty feet high, if an inch. Fire she breathed through ‘er nostrils, and ‘er eyes shimmered like the mornin’ sun. I encountered this beast whilst fishin’ off the Outer Hebrides during a terrible squall. Aye, she laid waste ta our rig, sending many a good man to the bottom o’ the sea. ’twas only through some Divine providence I lived ta tell thar tale. If I were ye, son, I’d stay away from wimmenfolk. Nothin’ but troubles, I sez! Nothin’ but troubles.

 If anything, I’m hoping this will give me a start in writing pirate/seafaring fiction… 

Welp, I have my July all planned out…