The one with Zoe Deschanel (sp?)?!  Apart from the fact that her characters are always walking anti-woman clichés done so badly that she pisses off the chauvinistic male inside me because she's too dumb/annoying for how pretty she is and she pisses off feminists who don't understand that her characters are supposed to be caricatures of the worst women in existence…it looked like every other single-people sitcom ever without the cast chemistry that led to success for Friends and Seinfeld.  


Right.  

And the fact that people still watch and compliment lazy shows is why so much of TV just re-hashes old tropes and safe plot lines.  

That being said, I'm not actually a fan of BSG, mostly because somehow the alien attack that lowered humanity's population by 5 orders of magnitude somehow lead to the survival of only the unconscionable dicks and outright sadists.  But I also didn't watch the whole series straight through, so I'm probably missing something.  I might do that if I have the free time after I finish the reading lists my girlfriend and my best friend have given me over the past week (about 4,000 pages in total split between '70s fantasy and academic literature). 

As a corollary, Joss Whedon seems not to really appeal to a wide audience: the few people that love him love him, and everyone else mostly just doesn't hate him.  I've liked everything I've watched of his, but I've also never been so attached that I follow something to its conclusion: I stopped watching Buffy after a few seasons, I only watched Angel in passing, I've only seen isolated episodes of Firefly, and I didn't actually make it through Dr. Horrible without skipping songs…and only got around to watching it at all when a girl kind of didn't give me an option.  Heck…I zone out periodically during Serenity. 

Frankly, I have a pretty good opinion of him for a writer/director/producer/etc. who has never made a show or movie that I actually looked forward to a new installment of. 

There are a lot of other well-done shows, though.  Breaking Bad really impressed me with where it's gone, even if it's a bit overly melodramatic for its own good.  

And the Pirate-king arc that's going on in Archer is priceless.  It's not quite "Terms of Enrampagement," or the episode where Pam gets kidnapped (hey, you guys!  check out his little spots!!) but it's good. 

Umm. 

I didn't mind the article.  I found it interesting and halfway insightful, though I would have written a lot of it differently.  I'm having trouble clarifying my thoughts on subject at hand because I mostly just don't care about some random tech writer blogging about what she considered a bad date.  Mostly, I just have questions about why it got published where it was. 

I care about the response in some ways, but I mostly care because gamers see themselves as intelligent, and it appears that most of them couldn't come up with something more creative or insightful to say than generic pejoratives that don't actually mean anything. 

Anyway…Tait was right about Bereznak's decision not to date Finkel being valid: he wasn't what she wanted. 

And, the gamer community at large was right about that decision being–in some ways–shallow.  Who cares?  Everyone is shallow.  Every social strata, subculture, or other sociological division has some defining characteristics, and everyone judges people based on them.  Do you have any idea how many people would be pissed off at me if I wrote a blog post like that after some of the dates I've had? 

That question wasn't purely rhetorical.  Here's a short list of groups that would hate me if I were to write the details about every decision I make and everything that's going through my head on a first date:

• Christians
• Atheists
• Agnostics
• White Taoists
• Buddhists
• Pagans
• Feminists
• Sluts (note: I define this word very specifically, and it has nothing to do with # of partners)
  
• Virgins
• Girls with an IQ below 115 (please note, this includes 84% of the U.S. Population)
• Girls who describe their musical taste as "anything but hip hop and country."
• Metal/Industrial fans
• Drum & Bass fans
• Dubstep fans
• Punk fans who don't know who Joe Strummer is.
• Girls who think Black Eyed Peas make "techno."
• Girls who think deadmau5 is musically interesting in any way. 
• Girls who hate Opera, Classical, or Choral music
  
• Hippies
• Hipsters
• pot-heads
• Alcoholics
• Girls who like/liked Sex and the City
• Girls who wear Jeans Shorts or Jeans Skirts
• Grils who wear Christian Audiger
• Equestrians
• Rednecks
• Hunters
• Vegetarians/Vegans
• Literature/English majors or degree holders
• Sociology majors or degree holders (if they got the degree in the U.S.)
• Gold-diggers
• Girls who went to college for an Mrs. degree
• Girls who want to be a stay-at-home Mom

I'm also currently dating a Feminist, Agnostic Industrial fan who's Mother trains horses and was wearing Jeans Shorts when we met. 

So, none of them are absolute "I won't date you" groups, but identifying any of them puts me in a mode where I start "playing Duress effects" to figure out if they're examples of the parts of those sub-cultures or groups that I can't stand.  Similar to Bereznak's little 3-strikes sentence, I can formulate questions I can ask based on any of those groups that lead to a similar decision tree, though most of them are not nearly as direct as hers.  Some of them (the Religions, mostly) get very complicated within minutes, and most of the time girls have no idea why I rejected them because it's almost never worth discussing: my views are no reason for them to change themselves. 

Bereznak's article–taken as the click-mongering and trolling it was–was deplorable, but this isn't a man v. woman issue or a nerd v. "normal" issue (whatever normal is supposed to mean).  The issue arose between two groups of people with vaguely arbitrary dating standards not being smart enough to do anything but hurl insults at each other. 

Bereznak isn't a bitch, she's just a troll who knows how to generate ad revenue. 

And, I honestly don't think that it's valid to call the entire gamer community misogynist just because they're too dumb to come up with better insults than "bitch," "slut," or "cunt".  That doesn't mean they don't respect women or any of the other generalizations that people have made: it just means that they're morons. 

Doctor Who
Mad Men
Archer

That's literally all I watch, though the right people have been suggesting that I take a look at the BBC Sherlock series, and I might do that if it's available on iTunes once this Dr. Who season is over. 

Details:

Doctor Who

I got into this late…I didn't start watching until Season 5 of the reboot (first w/ Matt Smith), and I did so thinking it was good "starin' tv," meaning that it was great to stare at when I didn't really care what I was watching but wanted something that was written and shot passably (and wasn't a BS crime drama).  After I finally realized that there was more to it than that, I went back and archive binged the reboot…and love it.  Unfortunately, the current writers and producers seem to be missing out on some of the really insanely interesting stuff that happened under Davies.  Specifically, the Impossible Planet and The Satan Pit are perhaps the best single plot arc of TV that I've watched.  Though presented in a thoroughly normal and almost trite way, the ideas therein rival some legitimate scholarship on related topics.  Throughout Davies/Tennant's tenure as Producer and the Doctor, ideas constantly come up that I've used in legitimate high-level discussions of philosophy and politics, specifically relating to the decline and replacement of Enlightenment thought and how anti-religion reactionary bullshit and strict adherence to radical empiricism in political and economic treatises and practices have affected the development of the Nation-State and lead to the current state of the world, not to mention giving me more linguistic tools with which to discuss religion without giving someone a reading list. 

Any TV show that has that lurking under the surface is worth putting up with–until this season–lousy special effects and layers upon layers of inside jokes that take a while to get. 

Plus…it's just awesome. 

Mad Men

It's just a TV show about alcoholic anti-heros, a douche bag, and a collection of women mostly better described as idiotic sluts, but it's a really good one.  Mostly, I like it because it makes it really easy to identify with a daytime-drinking, chain-smoking, serial polyamorist that I'd probably beat the crap out of in real life, which is at least interesting.  It's well-written, well-produced, and gorgeous, especially considering that I kind of think that the Modernist design style was abysmal; Mad Men remains one of very few examples of the Modernist style that doesn't piss me off in some way. 

I also adore the series's treatment of women in the era of the rise of Feminism for a number of reasons.  Primarily, I appreciate the contrast between Betty and Peggy/Jane.  Betty stands as the pre-Feminism ideal of a woman in an era where everything she'd been taught for her whole life was pronounced "wrong."  The problem is that she's a complete moron, and I like seeing the interactions between her and the other characters if for no other reason than that I identify with the characters that hate her; she reminds me of more than one of my ex-girlfriends more than I'd ever like to admit.  But at least I'm not the only one.  Conversely, Peggy is so incredibly asexual through most of the series that she seems to exemplify what one side of the Feminist movement was going for–the idea that women can succeed based on merit–with only cursory slips into the whole "I'm not actually equal yet and it's your problem because you're my boss" argument that I tend to label writing mistakes and ignore, at least in terms of her character.  Jane–on the other hand–abuses the freedom she's been granted to her own ends.  She is the polar opposite of Peggy in just about every way: hyper-feminine to a fault with a mindset that was exclusively allowed to males previously. 

The presentation of Betty's fall combined with the continuing battle between Peggy and Jane's ideologies and behaviors mirrors the central debate of Feminism that seems to still weigh heavily on society and confuse women fifty years later. 

Archer

It's hilarious.  That's really about all there is too it, but it's the best comedy series I've seen in a long time. 

Who would have thought that smashing together the last 60 years of technology in a way that makes absolutely no sense at all and replacing James Bond's character flaws with even more character flaws would produce something worth watching? 

Other

I'm seriously considering picking up Davies's Sherlock on BBC as mentioned above and possibly Walking Dead.  I went to a WD panel at Dragoncon a few weeks ago with friends who actually watch it, and the actors they had on the panel (Laurie Holden, Steen Yeun, Chandler Riggs, Madison Lintz, Andy Rothenburg, and some little blonde zombie chick who's name I can't remember) were really impressive.  They're freaking hilarious and very well composed…and based on that extremely limited interaction and running into her in one of the hotels a couple days later, Madison Lintz comes across as very close to the type of person I'd want my daughter to be if I ever have one.  And I like seeing what seemingly good people manage to do with themselves. 

Oh…and Mythbusters is impressive, but I don't follow it.  Adam Savage might be one of the most intelligent people I've seen IRL who wasn't specifically an academic.  Unfortunately, the show gets old after a while…I kind of just binge it once or twice a year when I'm bored, and it's not fiction, so I don't think of it in the same vein as the rest of TV. 

White Dragon's advice seems very sound as to when to pop a nihil or the like, but I'm still wondering why the nihil is better than a second Yixlid Jailer. 

Every time I've played a jailer against a dredge player–whether competent or not–they grimace.  The graveyard bombs buy you time, and they can be devastating.  But, in order to respond to triggers the way that Dragon suggests, it has to be on the board when the triggers hit. 

If they're activating Bazaar on your endstep and/or during their upkeep, they know whether they have to play around it or not.  If you hold it, you might be very far behind by the time you can play it, depending on what happened while they were digging for an answer to the Leyline that you mulliganed to. 

I have a lot less experience in Vintage than most of the people here, but I've tested that matchup a good bit and faced seemingly very competent dredge pilots in legacy and one small vintage tournament that I won.  And…I have never wished a Jailer was a graveyard bomb.  I have wished that a bomb was a jailer, which is why I didn't use Stephen's exact sideboard.  Since I made that change, I'm undefeated against dredge post board.  I haven't played that much…and I'm sure none of my opponents were world class vintage players…but the games have never really been all that close. 

I think the bombs leave too much up to chance compared to mulliganing to a leyline, running out a Jailer as soon as you have any protection (or as soon as they kill your leyline if you haven't found protection yet) and then trying to fight the fights that need fighting until you can go for the kill (basically just their anti-hate).  They're digging for about 8 cards that can remove your leyline…and by the time they get to one that you can't counter, either they've exiled a lot of what their deck does or a lot of anti-hate…often both. 

The opinions of the Dredge pilots I've talked to yield the same result.  Maybe the guys at the top are different, but most of them tend to just not care about bombs…they have to be out to work, so they play around it.  It's the equivalent of a couple time walks…not a weak play, but not an auto-win either.  Jailers piss them off. 

If you're going to run a bomb…I'd put it in as #7, not #6.  But that's just me. 

Wow, this looks like fun. 

I don't suppose anyone is coming up from Atlanta with a spot in their car?  Or wants to split gas? 

That has not been my experience.  In my testing, it's usually kinda close and often comes down to not drawing a bolt or an ingot chewer too late and holding on to hurkyl's until you're about to lose or just need one completely clear turn.  But I could be doing something wrong as well…or more than likely your opponents might be better than mine. 

Stephen, I look forward to your article.  Unfortunately, it's going to be a couple days late for my first vintage tournament where I'll be running something very close (-1 trygon, -1 bob, -1 ponder, + vault/key and a jace and some small tweaks to the sideboard).  It's testing well, but my playtesting partners have even less vintage experience than I do.  I'm wondering whether or not the changes are worth reducing the consistency of the draw. 

Nope. 

I got into magic through Legacy ages ago…got out…got back in…got out again…trying to get back in.  I played Standard for exactly one season and didn't flip my cards fast enough before the bottom dropped out and my deck was worth 10% of it's original (not peak) value.  Never sleeved up an extended deck once.  If I spend money any time soon, it'll be for finishing playsets, duals, and power if I can find more than the occasional T1 tournament. 

IMHO, Modern is just bad Legacy that's meant to be more affordable for people getting into it.  For me, the entire attraction to Legacy is getting to play with updates to the types of things I was playing in middle school (mostly decks with Force of Will, Hymn to Tourach, and/or duals) and the attraction to Vintage is finally being able to play with the cards I never could afford in middle school (though I really wish I'd bought into power when moxes were $120). 

Modern fills none of those requirements. 

Yep.  It's 15-proxies unsanctioned on Satuday at 6pm with an expected duration of 6 hours.  I'll be there if I can get the rest of the cards I need.  If there are going to be people from TMD, PM me and I'll give you my google voice number.  First pint is on me. 

Hi.

I've been playing Magic off and on since about 4th edition, just a bit late for Power .  I've been reading articles by contributors to this site for a long time and always wanted to get into Vintage.  Well…it's not getting cheaper.  Might as well start now if I can find anything going on in/around Atlanta. 

Sorry for making this my first post on TMD, I'll find the introductions forum in a second. 

But, while I'm thinking about it…there was live coverage of the T8…is it archived anywhere?  I can't seem to find it on eternal central. 

Congrats to everybody who was happy with how they did and condolences to everyone who had cards stolen.