Though a lifelong science fiction fan and admitted trekkie, I am not a connoisseur of zombie movies, or even of horror movies in general.  I can’t pretend to be an expert giving a review.  I can only give you my impressions of the movie as viewed from my feverish stupor.

This movie has the feel of something that would be produced by a high school student production.  It’s what you’d expect if the English class wrote the script (and not even the honors English class) and the extras were made up of fellow classmates and the family and friends of the production crew; if the make-up was done by the cosmetology students from the community college; if somebody who is good with a Mac did the special effects; if they borrowed a lot of the props and probably built a few in the machine shop, and filmed the scenes in deserted backlots in Toronto.  Somehow, they talked a Hollywood B-lister, Ving Rhames, into starring.  The production budget was raised from a PTA bake sale.

The story follows a group of survivors across the country, trying to make it to the island of Catalina off the coast of California.  Along the way, they kill a lot of zombies, some of them get turned into zombies, and some of them just get eaten.  Oddly, they keep killing the same zombies, though I suspect this had more to do with a lack of extras than the re-spawning abilities of the zombies. They do eventually encounter some kewl zombie zoo animals.

The acting isn’t horrible.  It’s what you’d expect from a community theatre.  There is some dialogue designed to get you interested in the characters, but it was written by somebody with the emotional repertoire of a teenager.  The gory fight scenes, which follow one right after the other, fill in where a more expensive movie would have drama.

That’s not to say that I didn’t enjoy the movie.  I was entertained, though sometimes not in the way the film makers wanted me to be.

So why am I talking about a zombie movie?

There were archers!!  Well, sort of.

Some of the survivors were the school archery team of some university (I didn’t catch the name) and their coach.  And, on the screen, their arrows went exactly where they were supposed to.

Allow me to clear my throat here.

I know that the budget was near zero.  But is it too much to ask that they find a real archer who could give the actors a half-hour lesson on how to shoot?  Or lacking that, isn’t there some professional responsibility on the part of the actors to say, “Hey, if I’m going to shoot a bow on screen, I’d better look like I know what I’m doing.”

It was painful to watch these actors playing competitive college archers, demonstrate that they hadn’t held a bow in their lives until five minutes before filming started.

The scenes which show them loosing arrows are almost comedic.   I tried to find online photos of these scenes, but the produces wisely kept them off the internet.  Ironically, there was a bit of dialogue where one survivor asks the other, “Why bows?”

“Because all the ammunition was already taken.  The sports stores still had archery equipment.”

“That’s because almost nobody knows how to shoot a bow!”

Zombie Apocalypse was followed by Resident Evil: Apocalypse (see the connection here?) which I could stomach until the scene where, knowing that the dead once again walked the earth, they decide to take a short cut through the graveyard.

I don’t believe I’ll ever develop a taste for zombie movies.

Ĉiuj ponzikomplotoj devas disfali, ĉar la gajnado superas pagadojn.  Kio okazos tiam?

Ĉu eblas, ke la disfalo jam okazas?  Eblas, ke la Granda Recesio de 2008 estas averto ke ni jam superis la atenditajn gajnojn.  Eblas, ke la aktuala teorio de ekonomio “Aŭ kresku aŭ mortu,” kiun preskaŭ ĉiu ĉiplanedano uzas, jam finfine superis la kapablon por kreski.

The names of the moons tend to be seasonal – like the Harvest Moon, though many lack a certain coolness.  For instance, I don’t care at all for the Worm Moon.

My beloved and I have created our own set of names for the moons.  For instance, we call the moon in late June the “Strawberry Moon” and celebrate the full moon be coming up with creative ways to eat our favorite summer  fruit.  We borrowed from some of the more standard names, like the aforementioned Harvest Moon.  This year, we are combining it with a cheese making party.

While admiring the full moon in May 2010, which we currently call the Full Flower Moon (borrowed from the Farmers’ Almanac), it occurred to me that any full moon which happens in late May or early June takes place in the constellation Sagittarius.  The celestial archer.

Sagittarius

I think this is a great idea for the name of a moon!  The Archers’ Moon!  Anybody who knows me, or has read one or two of my previous posts knows that this is a favorite topic of my blogs.  Specifically, traditional archery. How more traditional than the ancient zodiac?! Here it is, my favorite sport, immortalized in the heavens.  And it’s just as official as any of the other names of the moons.  That is, not at all.  But it’s personally relevant.

Hope everybody enjoys the Strawberry Moon on June 26th!

Newbie archers at the SF Archers Public Outreach program, June 6, 2010

It was decided yesterday that the San Francisco Archers Public Outreach program needs new equipment.  This topic has been cussed and discussed before, but yesterday was the clincher as we had to turn a dozen people away because we ran out of loaner equipment and arrows.  The photograph shows about 1/3 of the crowd that showed up, even on a cool foggy morning.  Fortunately, is was a crowd of mostly adults who listened to instructions well, because the four of us instructors would have gone running away screaming if it had been an equal number of kids.

I mentioned in a previous post the reasons I think  a poor economy is good for archery.  Basically, it’s a lot cheaper than golf.  We have also noticed a trend in the popularity of the sport which follows the release of any popular movie which features archers.  The recent release of  Ridley Scott’s Robin Hood, starring Russell Crowe, is an excellent example.  This is a very adult version of Hood, and so we got a lot of adults at outreach.  But you should have seen all the kids who showed up after the release of The Lord of the Rings.

Of course, it’s relatively easy to get a group of strangers to show up to try archery once.  We measure the success of our efforts by the number of people who continue to show up after the novelty of it wears off, and they realize that they can’t become expert archers in a single morning’s practice.  We know we have them hooked when they ask, “So, how much does it cost for a good bow?”  We get as excited as any drug dealer.

There are easily half a dozen very good archery ranges in the San Francisco Bay Area, and I explained to two women from San José that they could probably find one closer to where they live.  They don’t have to drive all the way to Pacifica to enjoy the sport.  They responded, “But you guys take care of us.”  That had me walking on air for several hours.

There tend to be two kinds of potential archers who show up: The technophiles who start drooling at the sight of the latest Matthews hunting compound, and those who are attracted to the sexy lines of the recurve or the earthy simplicity of the longbow.   The second group takes more attention because, quite frankly, it’s easier to become competent with a modern compound than a recurve or longbow.  For the second group, who are probably getting frustrated with their lack of accuracy, we make an effort to complement their form and point out their improvements.  There is very little in the way of instant gratification in traditional archery.

At the end of three hours, we did a thorough search for lost arrows, put the equipment away, and sat down to discuss our successes and failures.  We gotta get more equipment!

Like I said, this is a fantasy.  I’m well aware of all the practical problems involved.  But evidently, we are not alone.

According to the people who are in charge of keeping track of these things, the five-year farm census in 2007 indicates almost 300 thousand start-up farms since 2002, most of them small, and a huge proportion of them are owned by women.

It would seem that the United States is backwards from other industrialized nations.  While the populations of other countries is moving from the farm to the cities, the United States is moving back to the farm.

Goats

Taking advantage of this trend, Rick and Lora Lea Misterly have started a farm school at their spread in eastern Washington State called Quillisascut Farm.  The class is Intro to Farming and gives an overview of small, organic and sustainable farming, aiming to expose all us urban gardeners who have romanticized farming to the harsh realities of agribusiness.

Learning about grafting

Being the kind of people who eschew vacations spent on cruise ships, ski slopes and haute spots, Beth and I plunked down $695 each for tuition, room and board and traveled by air from San Francisco to Spokane.  We rented a car and drove two hours north along US Hwy 395 (somehow resisting the nearly overwhelming urge to stop in at the archery store in Chewelah) to a place in the world where people are few.  We then spent five days working on the farm and listening to people talk about farming.

We woke up before sunrise, which is really early this time of year that far north.  We milked goats, tended the garden, did morning chores, and sat down for breakfast.  After breakfast, it was cheese making, and more garden chores, and lectures on topics like tools, irrigation and fencing.  The afternoon found us traveling to other farms to learn about orchards, bees and mulching.  Then back to Qullisascut for dinner and a post meal lecture by yet another farmer on the topics of budgets, rabbits (did you know that the American Chinchilla is a rabbit? I had no idea), and botanical herbs.  We finally got to bed by 9:30 and were grateful for it.

The first thing we noticed is that everybody we met started their farm while still working full time for somebody else, and years later, some of them still are.  The second thing we noticed was their passion for this way of life.

Learning about bees

There were 12 students, ten of us from California, one from Hawaii and one from Seattle. There were 11 women.  Working, eating and bunking together, we all became fast friends.  Thus the third thing we noticed was that we were all of a certain socio-economic and racial background — white, middle class, mostly liberal and predominantly middle aged.   The question was finally asked, “Did previous classes have any more diversity?”

“Well, er, no.”

I will leave it as a homework problem for the ready to figure out why not.  I tried some guesses, but there were all just WAG’s.  Certainly poor people can’t afford the class or the travel, and rich people aren’t in the market for small, labor intensive enterprises, especially when the CEO needs to milk goats and tend the garden before breakfast.  Liberal because the focus was on organic, sustainable farming.  But white?  Perhaps because Idaho, a mere long bowshot away, has taken on a reputation as the last bastion of white male supremacists in the United States, though that didn’t stop the four lesbians in the class.  I refuse to openly speculate on the female aspect of the student body, fearing to sound sexist.

For more pictures, go here.

“Dragon Age: Origins is the spiritual successor to Baldur’s Gate.”

I have no idea what that sentence means.  I never played Baldur’s Gate.  And if I didn’t get sick (I don’t know if it was swine flu, but it knocked me on my butt for a week) in early December, 2009, I wouldn’t have played Dragon Age: Origins. But there I was, looking for something more creative to do than watch television, and I didn’t have any new books on hand to read.  My son, Galen, suggested, “Why don’t you download Dragon Age? It has logic puzzles and is driven by characters and story-line.  It isn’t just a ‘shoot and loot’ game.  I have it on my old laptop.  You can borrow it.”

That’s how I got hooked on the game.  Even more so when I found out that Estel, one of my archery/SCA friends, was also playing the game.

The aspect which hooked me is that, during game play, one must make a series of ethical decisions that are not always cut and dried. In spite of my best intentions, people still suffered because of the choices I made.  There are all these unintended consequences that are not apparent at the time.  What does this remind you of?  Real life, perhaps?

The game is a reminder that we live in an ethically grey universe, that not all evil comes from external daemons. Even the arch-badguy really did have the best interests of the kingdom in mind when he betrayed the king.   There is a scenario in the game where you have to decide what to do with a human who is dealing in elven child slavery.  You don’t have the resources to eradicate his organization.  And you know that if you simply put a stop to his current operation, he’ll be back as soon as you leave the city.  And the local gendarmes don’t care about elven children.  But there may be a way to profit politically from the situation.  How do you deal with it? Indeed, the world of featherless bipeds in this game-universe is rife with racial tension between humans, elves and dwarves, and your character must successfully navigate this social minefield.

Your character will accomplish this through a series of dialogue vignettes, where you must choose a response from a list.  The response that you REALLY want to give isn’t always listed, but that’s part of the storyline, and the responses will vary from cowardly to insane, with a few reasonable ones in the middle.  You learn quickly that picking a single style of response is not always situationally correct.  Sometimes you have to be deferential, sometimes a badass.  Diplomacy comes in all flavors.

Then there is the possibility of romance with some of the AI characters, including same-sex romances.  There isn’t any total nudity (although, one would think they could have found nicer under-things) and the sex acts are implied.  Regardless, the game strongly deserves its Mature rating.  There is some foreplay dialogue that caused me to flush.  (Something about licking poles in winter.  You had to be there.)

I am loathe to call this product a game.  It’s more like an interactive epic movie, with voice acting done by huge names in science fiction and fantasy:  Kate Mulgrew, Tim Russ, Tim Curry, Claudia Black and Steve Valentine.   It’s certainly far more engaging than television, and can be more interesting than a book as the plot can go in many different directions, depending on your choices.  You may even have to make the Ultimate Sacrifice in order to win the game.

What amazes me every year is that in an era of mass commercial production of goods, there exists an entire subculture economy of people who still hand-craft their products.  We had a pleasant conversation with a couple who make clothes and sell them not only at the Dickens Fair but all of the Renaissance Faires and SCA events, too.   You can visit their website at http://www.VelvetBedlam.com.

The cost of these goods is considerably more than what you’ll find at retailers like Target and Wal-Mart.  Quality hand-crafted goods will always be more expensive.  But if you’re the kind of person who would rather buy the cheap plastic crap at those stores, then the Dickens Fair/Renaissance Faire/SCA really isn’t for you anyway.

We spent most of our time taking in the stage shows and other presentations, which were free if you don’t count the gate cost.  We splurged and bought some roasted chestnuts and fudge, but for the most part the food was way over priced, and the argument could not be made that it was hand-crafted.

Why is this? you might ask. Isn’t Esperanto supposed to be the easiest language in the world to learn?

Yes, and basic Esperanto is a breeze.  ”La ĉielo estas blua.” “Mi malsatas. Ni manĝu.” “Kie estas la necesejo?”  ”La plumo de mia onklino estas sur la tablo.”  ”Mi donis libon al Karlo.”

Very basic.  Very concrete.  And if we were, say, a race of hounds who live only in the moment and only think about things they can see, taste and smell, that would be all that would be required of any language.  But human thought involves so much more than the current moment, concrete nouns and simple verbs.  We think abstractly, hypothetically and subjunctively.  We talk about things we can only infer without actually witnessing.  I have heard it said that without the subjunctive, one can only speak Italian with a limp.  I would say the same about any language.

Once ideas become more complex, the language must accommodate or it’s useless to humans.  With humans, conversations turn abstract with very little prompting, and the komencantoj quickly become lost.  Fortunately, the problem is solved with practice and familiarity.

An example of this is illustrated by the translation of the phrase, describing the Society for Creative Anachronism, “The Middle Ages as they should have been.”

The best I could do was, “La Mezepoko kiel ĝi devintus.”  (There is nothing illegal about the use of the word devintus though many experienced esperantists have warned me about it.  The preferred usage evidently is ” … kiel ĝi estus devinta.” though that sounds awkward to me.  And if you google the word devintus you’ll find it used other places by quite fluent esperantists.  ”It’s not common usage,” some will complain.  But “… should have been” also is not a common phrase.)  We are talking about the conditional past.  How more abstract can you get?  It’s easy to talk about the conditional future, even the conditional present.  But the conditional past? As if the past were a malleable thing? Generally a topic for geeks, eh?  Only a first class language could tackle that.  Is Esperanto, by this definition, a first class language?  You tell me.  For my money, the nunaj komencantoj will be slinging the subjunctive lingo inside six months.  A year tops.

Vivas ni dum interesaj tempoj, en la ĉina senco.  Ĉiutage legas mi, ke la tutmonda ekonomio aĉas.   Kial?  Oni povas kulpigi aŭ liberalismon aŭ konservatismon aŭ tutmondan varmigon aŭ la benzinomilitojn ktp.  Tamen, estas memklare ke ni usonanoj daŭras sendi la monon al Ĉinio, tiam prunteprenas ree ĝin por fari militon kontraŭ homoj, kiuj uzas religion (la politigado de fido) por batali nin.

Kial ni sendas la monon al Ĉinio?  Ĉar ni haltis esti nacio de senripozaj produktantoj kaj iĝis nacion de sobraj konsumantoj. Ni obsedas pri la aĉeto de plastaĵaĉoj ĉe Wal-Mark kaj Target kaj Costco.  La nuntempa esenco de ĉi tiu estas spegulita en la debato temante “aŭ iPhone aŭ Droid?”

Ĉu vi kredas vere, ke tiuj uzaĵoj kaŭzus, ke vi estu pliproduktema?   Kial?  Ĉu vi ne nun estas produktema?  Ĉu via nuntempa poŝtelefono ne bone funkcias?  Kial vi postulas novan?  Eble vi kredas, ke por plibonigi la ekonomion, vi devas havi plian ŝuldon.

Ĉu la iPhone kaǔzus, ke vi estu plibona homo?  Ĉu estas aplikaĵo por tio?

Aliflanke, mi aŭdas per la radio reklamojn por pezperdadaj mirakloj, sekretoj por gajni junecon kaj belecon, planoj por rapide gajni riĉecon, metodoj por facile lerni lingvojn, kaj aliaj neeblaĵoj.  Ili vendas nur promesojn, kiuj forvaporiĝos kiel la rideto de politikisto.  Versajnas, ke homoj intencas preni nian monon kaj doni preskaŭ nenion.

Jes, miopinie, la Droid kaj iPhone tre mojosas. Tamen, faru liston.  Dek Metodoj por iĝi Plibonan Homon.  Vetos mi, ke tiu listo ne enhavos la erojn, “Aĉetu ilon Droid” aŭ “plijuniĝu” aŭ “vendu nenion por gajni multe da mono.”  Eble vi skribos, “Plie kultu kruelan, venĝeman, bagatelan kaj  ĵaluzan dion, kaj frakasu la senkredulojn!”  Tamen, tio estas temo por alia artikolo.

La nuntempa tutmonda ekonomio funkcias per fumo kaj speguloj, kaj tio helpas nur malmutle da homoj.  Kio okazos kiam la fumo iras for?

I cannot imagine a more challenging social situation than trying to be improvisationally funny. Telling memorized jokes is easy. Reading a comedic script is a snap. Doing a stand-up routine that has been rehearsed and choreographed is a piece of cake compared to what the Asylum Improv does several times a year at the Spindrift Players in Pacifica, California.

It’s because of this that we don’t expect the actors of Asylum, lead by the very brave Roger Genereux, to be as funny as Ryan Stiles and Colin Mochrie, who are comedic geniuses, but they’re already funnier than Drew Carey.

It’s perhaps fortunate for the cast of Asylum that the audience consists primarily of the family and friends, and some die-hard community members, so we aren’t as critical as we could be. Asylum really does try hard to be funny, and one often gets the feeling that they are trying too hard. Sometimes desperately hard, which is evident when the look on an actor’s face plainly says, “Will somebody Please end this scene?” Which is echoed by Roger’s expression which says just as plainly, “Will somebody Please say something funny?”

There are, however, gems which make waiting through the embarrassing moments worthwhile.  We especially liked the efforts of Steve Mattes, Kevin Myer and Lourie (whose last name I couldn’t find, but he’s the bloke with the almost-Irish brogue, softened, I think, by his years in the States).  Lourie can always be counted on for a funny routine involving the alphabet and/or the English language.  Tricia Callero once again wow’d us with her superb vocal skills.  We can’t help but think that if the entertainment industry really was a meritocracy, she’d already be head-lining.

The presentation could be improved if Roger could just relax a little.  We think he’s very smart and talented, but he often comes across as if he believes his entire worth as a human being is riding on the success or failure of the show.  And considering the amount of work he invests at Spindrift, we can’t blame him for feeling that.   But Roger:  We are going to like you anyway.  You have already proven yourself.  So relax.  Also, if you can’t read one of those audience suggestion slips, you should just toss it.  There is no entertainment value in watching you try to decipher somebody’s scribble.  And we know that it’s supposed to be improv, but perhaps a little more structure would help lubricate the show.

And we will be there when you return in March!