10-3-07

DVRs for tonight:
8pm Pushing Daisies (CW) - saw a sneak preview of this pilot and it is GOOD.
9pm Bionic Woman (NBC) and Private Practice (ABC)
10pm CSI:NY (CBS)

Another featured contributor to The Daily Show gets his own series on Comedy Channel, produced by Jon Stewart: Demetri Martin.

Astronomers have spotted a young star with a belt of dust they suspect is going to form into an Earth-like planet.

GrubHub is a new service in the SF area that shows all restaurants that deliver in your area (you give address, they list restaurants, show menus, reviews, etc.). You can even narrow results to "deliver now" which is useful when you're craving Chinese during a weekend afternoon and the 1st 3 restaurants you call don't deliver until evening (do I sound bitter?). Looking at my address, I find that Hometown Noodle delivers. Who knew? The article where I found out about it is here.

Don't watch this where people with sensitive ears can hear, but Robot Chicken mocks "Buck" Rogers.

A model rocket group have built a 21-foot X-Wing Fighter (they even included the R2-D2) and are launching it this week.

One of the potential new shows to be developed by Rob Thomas for ABC is a new version of Cupid (the 90s show with Jeremy Piven that started Rob Thomas' career).

Nick Park is making a new Wallace and Gromit short film called "Trouble at Mill" to play on the BBC late next year.

CNet has a slideshow of private industry players in space travel.

Rant warning: Copyright issues have gotten completely ridiculous. (As a disclaimer: I will never be the focus of their concern because I don't care that much about music. Most of the music I listen to is on the radio in my car, on a satellite channel from DishNetwork, or on Launchcast from Yahoo. I haven't even played a CD in over a year and I don't own a digital player.) That being said, Sony now says it is stealing if you rip a CD that you bought to play in an iPod for your own use - you should pay for a digital copy as well as the CD copy. All earlier decisions said it was OK to make a back up copy for yourself for your listening - you aren't going to be playing them both at the same time. This is the same Sony that pissed people off a year or 2 ago by putting copyguards on their CDs that acted as viruses. They just make me want to boycott them completely.

They've identified a new dinosaur in Utah: a giant duck-billed vegetarian they are calling Gryposaurus monumentensis.

In pain? Bring on the chili peppers. Research shows that capsaicin, the chemical in chili peppers, may be able to block pain receptors without interfering with other nerves or causing numbness.

Roundup for 8-31-07

It sounds a bit like friends having a joke together, but Kristen Bell and Clark Duke from Greek say they are forming a band. Well, we know they both can sing, let's just hope they choose better lyrics than that "Darwin Lied" song from Greek (and not quite as absurd as Reefer Madness).
http://community.tvguide.com/blog-entry/TVGuide-Editors-Blog/Ausiello-Report/Kristen-Bell-Hero/800021347?rssDate=12345678
http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2007/08/internet_tv_star_clark_duke_to_form.html#more

The skywatch alert for tonight is actually 830-9pm (much better than 130-6am for the eclipse). It is supposed to be a good time to see the Draco the Dragon constellation.
http://www.space.com/spacewatch/070831_ns_draco.html
However, there is another skywatch alert for early tomorrow morning: a rare meteor shower that could be amazing or could be a complete dud.
http://www.insidebayarea.com/ci_6768311?source=rss

Robot Chicken on the Last Unicorn. This is so incredibly WRONG.
http://www.sfsignal.com/archives/005567.html

Masi Oka commenting on the fact that Bittorrents were used to watch Heroes in France before the TV airdate.
http://torrentfreak.com/heroes-star-recognizes-benefits-of-bittorrent/

Great casting for the Royal Shakespeare Company, but potentially weird scheduling, delays or a new Doctor Who for season 5. David Tennant and Patrick Stewart are going to star in Hamlet next year. Afterwards, David Tennant will play in Love's Labor's Lost.
http://www.comicmix.com/news/2007/08/30/fanboy-meltdown-picard-meets-the-doctor/

XM Radio is going to start doing audio versions of classic books in 30-minute installments, starting with Fahrenheit 451. I don't know how many will be SF, but it probably doesn't matter since I don't have XM radio. :(
http://www.latimes.com/features/books/la-bkw-xmradiobooks30aug30,0,7607137.story?track=rss

Monday is the Kyle XY mid-season finale, and they promise it will answer some questions but have a cliffhanger. Of course.
http://www.scifi.com/scifiwire/index.php?category=1&id=43814

There are rumors of ANOTHER Dune movie. I think they've pretty much covered Dune, and I'd like to see them get to another book, but who knows.
http://www.scifi.com/scifiwire/index.php?category=7&id=43792

Rumors are that, schedules permitting, Zoe Saldana will be the new Uhura.
http://trekmovie.com/?s=zoe+saldana&searchbutton=go%21

NASA images are going to be archived online by the Internet Archive. This includes non-digital images like the Apollo moon landings they will have to convert, films, videos, etc.
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/T/TECHBIT_SPACE_IMAGES?SITE=WIRE&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

Anne McCaffrey's website has added a chronological order list. We should double check our BookCat entries for series order.
http://www.annemccaffrey.net/2006-Pern-Reading-Order.pdf

Preliminary schedule for Atlantis shows no midseason break. Only 4 weeks off during the season for holidays. This is too amazing to be true, I'm sure they'll change their minds. Possible spoiler warning: there are TV Guide level descriptions of the first 8 episodes.
http://www.gateworld.net/news/2007/08/preliminary_schedule_for_iatlant.shtml

Reminder, if you are interested, TOR is podcasting from Worldcon in Japan (which started today).
http://www.tor-forge.com/podcasts

Interesting new science development for preventing nasty diseases:
http://www.upi.com/NewsTrack/Science/2007/08/28/discovery_might_render_viruses_harmless/1552/

Really good interview with John Scalzi.
http://www.januarymagazine.com/profiles/scalzi.html

Something I bet we all need: Top 10 Ways to Clean Your PC
http://lifehacker.com/software/lifehacker-top-10/top-10-ways-to-clean-up-your-pc-294189.php

NBC won't use ITunes for its shows. I hope they provide a good alternative if you miss an ep.
http://www.sfsignal.com/archives/005573.html