Category Archives: arts and entertainment

Spoken Like a True Ro-Man

Ro-ManRemember
that cheesy movie I mentioned – Robot Monster? Well, a quote from that monstrosity
(pun intended) really stuck with me. Which world leader does this remind you of?

Your people were getting too intelligent. [LAUGHS UNCONTROLLABLY.] We could not
wait until you were strong enough to attack us. We had to attack you first.

Radio That Doesn’t Suck


If you’re like me, you’re sick of most or all of your local radio stations. There
are too many commercials, the morning shows aren’t funny and you’d rather hear music
anyhow, the formats are stale, the playlists are too short and repeat too much,
modern rock is trite and offensive, and only bands with major contracts get played.
Well, there’s an alternative. It’s not on FM, but it’s still cool enough to mention.
It’s Radio Paradise.
Give it a listen sometime.

Each hour of music is carefully blended together to flow smoothly between different
musical styles & genres – just like real DJs used to do on FM. We don’t use
the computer-generated playlists or “carefully researched music libraries”
that have sucked the soul out of FM radio – and we never just throw songs together
at random the way many web stations do.

We also depend on input from you to help fine-tune our music mix. If you hear something
that you feel strongly about (either positively or negatively), please take a moment
to post a comment on that song. Just click the song title on the playlist or in
the mini-browser window. We’d also love to hear from you if there’s an artist you
don’t hear, but think would fit in with our music mix. Registered users can upload
suggested additions to the library for review.

The Grand Wizard of Earthsea

I love the Earthsea series of books. I’ve read the original trilogy and the follow-up,
Tehanu. I hope to pick up the new stories some day soon. I was really looking forward
to watching the Sci-Fi Channel’s screen adaptation of the first two books of the
trilogy, but now I’m less enthused.

A Whitewashed Earthsea
How the Sci Fi Channel wrecked my books.
By Ursula K. Le Guin

On Tuesday night, the Sci Fi Channel aired its final installment of Legend of Earthsea, the miniseries based – loosely, as it turns out – on my Earthsea books. The books, A Wizard of Earthsea and The Tombs of Atuan, which were published more than 30 years ago, are about two young people finding out what their power, their freedom, and their responsibilities are. I don’t know what the film is about. It’s full of scenes from the story, arranged differently, in an entirely different plot, so that they make no sense. My protagonist is Ged, a boy with red-brown skin. In the film, he’s a petulant white kid. Readers who’ve been wondering why I “let them change the story” may find some answers here.