Blargh

So... very... tired. Work is simply overwhelming right now - I have a ton of stuff to finish before I begin my postdoctoral fellowship, and once that's done I have a postdoctoral fellowship grant to write. Bleah.

But the good news is that I finally got my comics I ordered. Apparently they got the address wrong the first time and they were shipped back, but as soon as I have time to scan them in I can write a few comic posts. I have to say that "Secret Wars," for a cheap marketing gimmick created to tie in with a failed toy line, was just as much fun to read as I remembered. The entire story has its ups and downs, but the last three issues featured Dr. Doom at his very evil best which makes up for a lot of the fluff in between.

Anyhoo, as soon as I emerge from the lab, I'll have a few things up. In the meantime, I highly recommend "Get Smart" - was much, much more fun than I expected it to be and the entire cast looked like they had a blast making it.

Octagon Global Recruiting

Hey, I just got an e-mail from the DHARMA Initiative! Check it out:

Octagon Global Recruiting

Octagon Global Recruiting, on behalf of the Dharma Initiative, would like to thank you for registering your expression of interest in our latest volunteer recruitment drive.

We will be launching in San Diego on July 24th at Comic-Con International offering select registrants the opportunity to take an exciting aptitude test that will give applicants the chance to demonstrate their unique talents.

The Dharma Initiative hopes you will be able to join us to find out more about their ground-breaking new research project. We will contact you closer to the date with more information.

For those not able to join us in San Diego, Dharma's full recruitment program will be made available online to registered recruits after July 27th.

In the meantime, the Dharma Initiative urges you to spread the word. Invite your colleagues to join the team at www.octagonglobalrecruiting.com and take part in this once in a lifetime opportunity.

THIS IS AN OFFICIAL COMMUNICATION OF THE DHARMA INITIATIVE:
This message and its attachments are confidential and may contain information which is protected by copyright. It is intended solely for the named addressee. If you are not the authorised recipient (or responsible for delivery of the message to the authorised recipient), you must not use, disclose, print, copy or deliver this message or its attachments to anyone. If you receive this email in error, please contact the sender immediately and permanently delete this message and its attachments from your system. Any content of this message and its attachments that does not relate to the official business of the Dharma Initiative or its subsidiaries must be taken not to have been sent or endorsed by any of them. No representation is made that this email or its attachments are without defect or that the contents express views other than those of the sender.

While I certainly won't be there, I'm looking forward to hearing what all this is about. Anyone going? :)

Update

Busy week again. Finished "The Time Traveler's Wife" and I'll have an extended review up eventually, but suffice it to say it was one of the most wonderful books I've ever read.

Turns out they're making it into a movie, coming out this Christmas, with Eric Bana and Rachel McAdams - to me, two very odd casting choices for Henry and Clare, who have become two of my favorite characters of all time. I do hope they're able to do the book justice.

Brown Paper Packages...

With the hiatus upon us, I thought I'd share a few of my favorite things on teh internets and I invite y'all to do the same. I figure it might give all some entertaining things to do since there's not going to be much LOST to write about in the next several months. These are five of my local pit stops on the internet. I have a lot of pit stops, so I tried to pick (non-Lost related) things all on different topics that might interest people - and I also tried to pick stuff that people might not know about.

1. Five Thirty Eight - If you're a politics and/or statistics junkie, this site is like caffeine-laced crack dissolved in Mountain Dew. While electoral prediction sites are abundant on the net, I was thrilled to discover that this one is run by Nate Silver, one of the grand gentlemen who runs my very favorite baseball site on the internet, Baseball Prospectus.

BP uses an incredible statistical model called PECOTA, created by Nate, to predict how a player will perform in a given season based on various parameters (age, past performance, injury history, plate discipline, etc...). Five Thirty Eight applies a similar method to the electoral college, predicting how well Obama and McCain will do in various states using a statistical model based on polls and various demographics. The model held up incredibly well throughout the primary season and now Nate will be gearing up the site for the general election. Can't recommend it enough if you follow politics.

Oh, and how hot is Nate right now? His site just got a write up in Newsweek.

2. Fark, Top Links - I've been a member of Fark for nearly five years now and a member of TotalFark for almost as long (and a Top 100 submitter there, thank you very much). While I don't spend as much time there as I used to (although TotalFark is still the best $5/month you'll ever spend and the TF Secret Santa is one of my favorite little joys of the season), I usually make it a daily stop to check out the Top Links page.

These are the best headlines/articles voted by the TF community. A link can make it either on headline or content alone. At the end of the year, the best annual headlines are voted on to choose both an overall winner and individual winners in several categories (Best Sports Headline, Best Punning Headline, etc...). TotalFarkers can read all the voted headlines (there's a longer list that appears if you're a member) and all the comment thread (Farkers can only read greenlit threads), but anyone can click on the actual associated stories on the left hand side.

Since these are the top voted stories, it's an easy way (kind of one-stop shopping) of browsing popular/entertaining stuff circulating around the web.

3. The Hot Sauce Blog - I'm a serious hot sauce junkie. I use it in place of ketchup (which I oddly can't stand) and my tolerance at this point is pretty much through the roof. One of my former roommates used to frequently wonder how in the world I could even taste anything since my taste buds should have been burned off long ago.

The Hot Sauce Blog takes their hot sauces seriously. They review anything and everything and I've gotten quite a few suggestions on different things to try from them. All their reviews are neatly organized in the sidebar - if you're looking for something new, just click and browse. Bar none, it's the best hot sauce resource on the internet.

4. Baseball Think Factory - This is my one-stop shopping for baseball headlines. The BTF is filled with incredibly intelligent fans (much moreso than i), journalists and columnists (including the fabulous Tim Marchman of the New York Sun and Howard Megdal of the New York Observer) all discussing the pertinent baseball stories of the day. The news headlines on the front page are generally some of the best baseball writing and news on the web. Big stories make it there, but also lesser known stories of interest, generally with a statistical bent.

5. Penny and Aggie - I love webcomics. Lots of webcomics.

Some of my favorites, in no particular order are:

Least I Can Do - Guy humor. Really, really, really funny guy humor.
Questionable Content - Drama and music. With robots.
Scary Go Round - The most bizarrely creative comic on the internet. Pure joy.
Zebra Girl - Beautiful art. Fun story. I wish Joe would update it regularly. *sigh*
Grim Tales/PPGD - Bleedman's art rocks and I love what he's done with familiar characters

But Penny and Aggie has the best current storyline right now and it's probably not as well known as some of the comics above. I wrote a previous review of P&A on StumbleUpon a while ago and said:

Think "Archie," but meaner and nastier - like real high school. Penny's the Veronica Lodge of the comic - rich, beautiful, even smart (although she hides it). She's also an alpha female - vindictive and cunning. Throw in a pinch of non-trashy Paris Hilton (if you can imagine that) and that's Penny.

Her nemesis is the strip's Betty Drake, Aggie - pretty, intelligent, and ambitious. The product of two hippies, she's an uber-liberal too; a political, vegetarian, peace-loving environmentalist who always speaks her mind. She hates everything Penny stands for: The popular Barbie Girl who's more style than substance. Aggie constantly taunts her, which causes Penny to retaliate, which prompts more taunts, lather, rinse, repeat, etc...

Ironically though, if the two of them actually sat down and talked, they'd find they're not as different as they'd like to believe.

I was blissfully ignorant in high school, so I was never really involved in any of the class warfare going on. Just kinda got along with everyone - played poker with the jocks, played video games with my friends - and I really didn't care about being popular, which seems to me to have been the key. But I imagine a lot of you can relate to the strip and the social dynamics of the age.

Right now, the comic's in the midst of it's most ambitious storyline yet, and I find myself looking forward to new strips more than any other I read. I can't recommend it enough. Check out all the archives online to get the full backstory. Fabulous art too.

So that's my five. Anyone have anything sites they want to share? Blog it, post in the comments and I'll provide a link. :)

Mets Rant

I don't want to get off on a rant here, but I'm having a crappy enough week as it is without my favorite baseball team piling on with their supremely sucky play. Bugs and Cranks today lists six things they'd do to fix the Mets. I started to write a comment there, but it ended up turning into a longish rant, so I figured I'd just post it here instead. Their six:

1. Trade Carlos Delgado, Aaron Heilman and ___ to Cincinnati for Adam Dunn
2. Demote Mike Pelfrey
3. Trade Carlos Beltran
4. Find another home for Moises Alou
5. Two catchers at a time, please
6. Promote from within

While I agree wholeheartedly with #4, #5, and #6, #3 is just silly, we have no real replacement for #2 and #1 doesn't have a snowball's chance in hell of happening. I'd love Dunn on the team, but unless the Mets were willing to give up F-Mart (and they aren't), they ain't getting him. Pelfrey is starting to look like a bust to me, since he still can't throw a breaking pitch for a strike, but he's young, cheap and doesn't come with a giant, expensive boot on his foot *seething anger at Omar*. And trading Beltran doesn't make any sense - he's third on the team in VORP this year at 14.5, low for him but still good, and he's under our control for the next three seasons.

The Mets do, however, need to purge all the old bench scrubs on their team. Since they currently sport one of the worst benches in baseball, why not bring up a bunch of young guys and give them a chance? It'll certainly be more entertaining to watch them fail than Fernando Tatis and Raul Casanova. Who knows, it might give the team some badly needed energy. Did anyone have any faith in Marlon Anderson when he came up last night in the ninth? I certainly didn't - he's been injured and awful this year. Seems the shine's off Endy too, dead last on the team with a -7.3 VORP (although he at least can still play defense).

They also need to start shopping people. Alou, Heilman and Schoeneweis all have less-than-negative value right now. Oliver Perez could interest a contending team. Luis Castillo has actually been reasonably productive and maybe could get a suck...er, team to take on that horrible contract of his. Delgado should just be cut outright and Mike Carp should be brought up. Even if he fails, it's still better than watching Carlos' corpse flail at another double down the line.

If I were Wilpons, I'd get rid of Omar too. I'm not a huge Willie fan, but I'm convinced Omar is more of the problem than Randolph. Omar simply places too much value on players he's familiar with and is obsessed with going with experienced veterans instead of youngsters. Yes, yes, he can sign the big-name free agent and maybe without him we wouldn't have Beltran or Santana. The trade for John Maine was also a steal. But think about this bench he's assembled. Think about the contract he handed to Castillo this offseason, El Duque last season. Think about Heath Bell, Brian Bannister, Ruben Gotay. Think about his fascinations with Brian Lawrence, Chan Ho Park, and... *shudder*... Jose Lima. I really think the main reason this team is struggling is because of how it's been assembled, not how it's being managed.

But the biggest problem here is that the Mets are trapped. Aside from Carp (who probably isn't ready yet, but couldn't be much worse than what they've got), they really have no one in the minors they can turn to for reinforcements. And it's too early in the season to start selling off players (although you can start gauging interest now). But the team needs a shakeup in the worst way, so here's what I'd do:

1. Release Delgado, call up Mike Carp from AA
2. Release Tatis, demote Casanova. Call up Chris Aguila (LF, .968 OPS) and the awesomely named Valentino Pascucci (RF, 1.008) from AAA
3. Start shopping

And, if this team doesn't improve by the break, Jeff and Fred need to find another general manager to run the mid-summer fire sale in Queens.

ADDENDUM: Ask and you shall receive. The Mets call up Aguila, DFAing Abraham Nunez. Hey, it's a start.

Blargh

Work's really busy right now. Should calm down by the end of the week. Here's an amusing Lost link that I don't have the time right now to expound upon. Here's another.

Just started "The Time Traveler's Wife." Only about 30 pages in, but I love, love, love it so far. :)

The Summer Wind...

... came blowin' in... with a new Lost Experience webgame. :)

Looks like it anyway. I mentioned that ABC ad that aired during the finale in my review from Octagon Global Recruiting, which asks you to enter an e-mail for a recruiting drive in San Diego, July 24th-27th.

Turns out, those dates happen to coincide with this year's San Diego Comic-Con. Can you say webgame, boys and girls? I probably won't have time to play given I'll have just started my postdoc, but I'll certainly keep tabs on how it's going. Any of you going to play?

Lost Episode Review 4.13, 4.14: "There's No Place Like Home, Parts 2 & 3"

Quote: "I hope you're happy now, Jacob."

Four seasons down, only two left to go. :(

Overall, I liked last night's episode. It fell a little bit short of my expectations, I think, because 1) by the end, it wasn't a surprise (to me), that Locke was in the coffin and 2) I think I was a bit put off by the way the writers handled the moving the Island bit.

Wasn't it Locke's destiny to move the Island ("Just wait until you see what I'm going to do")? Wasn't Locke the one who spoke to Jacob? Why didn't Jacob tell Locke what he had to do? And why did Ben suddenly feel all uncharacteristically magnanimous? Was he trying to make up for the fact he was responsible for the death of everyone on the freighter? I dunno. To me it just made the whole trip to the cabin feel like much ado about nothing.

But those are minor quibbles. The sun is shining, the birds are singing and Desmond is still alive and reunited with Penny. I'm so happy. :)

LOTS of questions today. Really the finale, even though it tied up a bunch of loose ends and showed us who's in the coffin, still gave us more questions than answers. So...

1. Where did the island go?

It probably traveled in both space and time, given that Ben was transported halfway around the world and ten months into the future. This also means Ben really didn't go to Tunisia with the express purpose of recruiting Sayid, he just happened to see him on TV and took advantage of the situation. So why is this a side effect of moving the island? Does moving the ice wheel open up a wormhole between that cavern and Tunisia? Seems very "Being John Malkovich" to me. :)

But if the Island has now been transported anywhere in space and time, it certainly answers two things: 1) Why Widmore can't find it and 2) likely how the Black Rock became lodged in the middle of the jungle. Chances are, the Island simply appeared out of nowhere underneath it sometime in the past!

Question now is, how are they going to find it again? Fumiko thinks Walt's going to be the key. Of course, if all the dead people on the island can contact the O6, one would think they could get some directions. Which brings us to...

2. What happened to Locke and how did he get off the island?

I'm guessing we won't get an answer to this until Season 6 (see below). Really the "who's in the coffin" question has just changed to "what happened to the person in the coffin" and it took us a full season to get that one answered. *sigh*

But even though we'll still see plenty of Locke through (presumably) flashbacks, I wonder if he's now going to go all Obi-Wan Kenobi on everyone? His character's always been kinda shamanistic, I wonder if his destiny now is really to become Jack's spirit guide and help him find his way. It is kind of puzzling too why the Island even allowed Locke to die. You would think if it went out of its way to protect Jack and the rest of the O6 (I really don't think Aaron survived the helicopter crash by pure turnip baby mojo alone), the Island wouldn't want Locke, its new chosen son, to be dead unless it was for a specific purpose. Maybe Locke HAD to die in order to convince them all to return. And maybe now that he's dead, he's really become "more powerful than you can ever imagine."

It's looking more and more like Jack might be the real man of destiny on the show. After all, Matthew Fox is purportedly the only cast member who knows how the show is going to end.

3. Does everyone have to go back?

If Locke's corpse is needed to get the Oceanic 6 back on the Island, it seems the "everyone" Ben mentioned is rather inclusive. Does this mean they need Ben, Desmond, Frank and Walt to back too? Is there anyone else I'm missing?

And, of course, this sets up all sorts of delicious plot devices for next season. Indeed it's one of the things that I thought the finale (and Season 4 in general) did exceptionally well. Kate's now a parolee that can't leave the state and she's been told by Claire NOT to bring Aaron back. Ben's trying to kill Penny and Desmond likely won't be wanting to leave Penny's side.

And then, in what was best scene of the episode, Sun actually wants to work with Widmore! In the words of the great Dread Pirate Roberts this might put a damper on their relationship.

So...

4. Has Sun really gone over to the side of... *raised pinky*... eeeeeevil?

The scene with Sun and Widmore was simply fabulous. It was the one scene in the episode where I really jumped off the couch with excitement. Dark Sun (which was actually the name of an old Dungeons and Dragons expansion set - yes, I'm a geek) offers so many plot possibilities it makes my head spin! And you just know Yunjin Kim would be simply fabulous in the role. If Sayid and Sun went at it, I'm not sure who I'd put my money on...



And we know Sun has a dark side too; how she got her maid fired to keep herself out of trouble and how she had an affair which not only got her lover killed, but was responsible for Jin becoming her father's hit man as well. But what is she trying to accomplish here? Does she want to get back to the Island? Does she blame Jack (or, possibly, Ben) and want revenge? Does she think Jin is still alive? Speaking of which...

5. Is Jin really dead?

One would think so, but it's possible he was blown off the freighter and into the radius of the island's teleportation perimeter. After which he could have been...

6. What happened to Daniel and the raft?

....picked up by Daniel and the raft. I'm assuming, since Daniel would certainly have seen the helicopter crash if he wasn't transported with the Island, that he was transported along with it. And maybe, just maybe, Jin was transported too and Daniel will swoop by and pick him up. Certainly looks like the raft was in the field, given the light here...



The one thing that makes me think Jin might be still alive is that he's the one person who could bring Sun back from the dark side (and maybe finding out he's still alive will prevent her from doing something horrible at a critical juncture).

7. Where are Penny, Desmond and Frank now? Does Widmore know where they are?

I guess the real question here is how much contact does Penny have with her dad? On one hand, if Ben wants to kill her, you would think Widmore would certainly want to warn her and keep tabs on her so make sure she's okay. But on the other hand, he hates Desmond so you would think they'd want to sever all contact with him and find someplace to hole up and live happily ever after.

And do they take Frank along? You would think he could probably return to his "normal" life if he wanted. But you would also think that if he did, Abaddon would have tracked him down to find out what happened to everyone. Is he living the good life with them somewhere?

BTW, when the chopper went down, I was so afraid Frank and Desmond were dead. I loved how they resolved it with Penny's boat. If it weren't for the Sun/Widmore scene, the Desmond/Penny reunion would have been my favorite of the episode.

8. Was Charlotte born on the island?

Oh, so tantalizing. Two throw away little lines that we'll probably not get an answer to for a long while. I'm betting Charlotte is the daughter of someone in the DI and somehow managed to escape the purge. Does she know Annie, Ben's childhood friend? Is she really Annie herself?

Man, I really want a Charlotte flashback.

9. Where's the real "magic box?"

Okay, so the Orchid isn't the magic box, it's just the DI's boring, old teleportation station. So where's the freakin' magic box then? Is it at the Temple? I bet we're not getting an answer to this one until the final season too. :P

10. How will the show be structured the next two seasons?

Fumiko and I were talking about this this morning. What makes it so difficult is that there are essentially three remaining storylines:

1) How the Oceanic 6 (and their friends) get back to the Island
2) What happened on the Island after it was teleported
3) What happens once the Oceanic Six get back to the Island

The only way I can see the show resolving these storylines given its present structure is if next season focuses on Jack and Ben struggling to get their band back together (#1), along with on-Island flashforwards showing bits and pieces of what they find when they return (part of #3). Thus, next season would end showing how the O6 actually returned to the Island in real time, kind of in parallel of how this past season was structured. Then, in the final season, we get the climax of the show (#3) structured around flashbacks of what happened on-Island after the Island was transported (#2).

Of course, if this is true, we probably won't find out what happened to Locke until Season 6. Bleah. But I really can't think of any other way they can do it unless they eliminate the flashbacks or forwards because the cast is so separated right now and you can't have a full season focusing on only half the cast! Anyone else have any ideas here?

Other Tidbits:

* It was nice to see Sayid kick some ass.

*Missie, over e-mail today:

"I am disappointed with Walt's lack of inquiry about Vincent. In fact, I'm just bummed we haven't seen much of Vincent lately at all"

"My [baseball] fantasy team next year may be called "Time Travelin' Bunnies."

That's just awesome.

* Selected thoughts from Matt, also over e-mail:

I wouldn't have had a hard time with Ben killing Keamy, but I do find it hard to believe that he took him out mano-a-mano with a knife. Keamy had just gone toe-to-toe with Sayid and lived to tell the tale, after all.

Even though I'm sick of "Christian," and more than sick of Michael, I thoroughly enjoyed Christian showing up to give Michael his pink slip.

Juliet, seeing Sawyer climb back onto the beach: "I'm missing Jack a lot less than I thought I would."

Sawyer, seeing Juliet half way into a bottle of Dharma Rum at the end of his swim: "I'm missing Kate a lot less than I thought I would."

Google "Jeremy Bentham auto icon." You won't be disappointed. Perhaps Season Five will be an acceptable substitute for the long awaited "Weekend at Bernie's III."

I just want to say here I thought the Sawyer cheesecase was totally gratuitous. Juliet and Kate both looked fabulous the past few episodes though. Wonder who does Jules' hair on the Island? ;)

* From my e-mail to Missie and Matt:

Could we be witnessing an evil Sun rise? Could the next two seasons bring us evil under the Sun? The punsabilities are endless!

I couldn't resist.

* Dark UFO, via Get Lost Podcast, has a collection of screencaps from the frozen donkey wheel room. Anyone see anything interesting?

* Uncle Fester?



* Sawyer called Jack "Sunshine" and Frank "Kenny Rogers"

* I loved that Hurley was playing chess with Eko, but I'm also saddened they couldn't get Adewale to do a cameo, which would have sent the awesomeness factor of the episode to 11.

* Also loved Jack's "see you in another life, brother" line to Desmond.

* Kudos to the Lost casting department. Not only did they find a toddler who really looks like he could be Claire's child, but they also found someone who has a head like a turnip!

* And speaking of Claire, even Em remarked last night that Emilie de Ravin looked kinda... puffy. Is she pregnant? Seems like a possibility given she's married now.

* I put my e-mail in at Octagon Global Recruiting, which looks to be the start of a possible summer Lost webgame, but haven't received anything back yet. Anyone get anything?

Summary: A solid, exciting finale, but (in my book anyway) still the weakest of the four finales (although that's nothing to be ashamed about). I think it especially pales in comparison to last year's finale whose twist took me completely by surprise and simply blew me away. By the time we saw Locke in the coffin, I had kind of guessed it was either going to be either Locke or some representation of Jacob (i.e. Christian Shepherd), partly due to Hurley's "Dude, why don't you just call him..." statement which just kinda sapped some of the suspense.

I didn't know about the alternate endings going in that, according to Lostpedia, were shot with Sawyer and Desmond in the coffin, but neither of those possibilities really even crossed my mind. I suppose, in retrospect, Sawyer being the messenger of doom could have been cool, but would it have had the same emotional impact of Locke being in there? I dunno. And, given where the show is heading, with an eventual confrontation between Ben, Penny and Desmond, I simply couldn't see them killing Desmond off after he survived the helicopter crash.

So I'm giving the finale a solid 4/5 as we enter the dismal, dark summer and fall of no LOST. My comic book reviews will be up eventually - if I don't receive them in the next week, I can pick up my original copies from my mom's house when I head there for a visit next weekend. I'll also be posting fairly regularly on various things throughout the hiatus though. :)

Review...

Man, there's a lot to write about this episode! It'll take me a bit longer than usual to post it - probably a bit later in the afternoon - because I'm still not finished and I have to start a couple things in the lab right now.

The death poll I had up the last couple weeks was interesting given last night. Most people who voted thought Jin would die (69% of you) and probably even more would have picked Michael if I had offered him as a choice (duh). But only one person picked Locke, which speaks to the happy lack of spoiler readers who stop by. :)

Of course, there's still a lot of questions around who's really dead or not. Drop by in a couple hours, certainly before the end of the workday. :)

One More Day

Hope everyone had a nice holiday! Em and I had a wedding to attend on Saturday, then spent the next three days down on the Jersey shore with her family. A simply delightful gathering that certainly helped whittle away the remaining time before tomorrow's super-awesome LOST finale! I still haven't received my comic books (grrrr - I have to write to the eBay guy again) so my write up is going to have to wait a bit longer.

So how did y'all spend the weekend? Did everyone get as lucky with the weather as the Northeast did? :)