Ohbalto Online Welcome to the new blog. Same as the old blog.

Stephen King and Ricky GervaisPosted by dhoffman on February 5th, 2009

That might seem an unlikely pairing, but bear with me, we’re going somewhere with this.

First, The Guardian has excerpts from an interview with Stephen King, wherein he discusses, among other things, how he feels Stephanie Meyers, the author of the Twilight teen-vampire books, “can’t write worth a darn.  She’s not very good.”

This has, as may be expected, outraged the legions of Twilight fans across the interwebs.  Their responses are some of the funniest things you’ll read all day.

You can read The Guardian article here, if you like.

For my part, I tried to read Twilight last year, honestly, I did.  I didn’t get very far in.  The problems I had were not with the ideas of “vegetarian” vampires, nor with vampires that get all sparkly (but don’t burst into flames) in daylight.

It was the writing.  Now, grain of salt this and I don’t want to worry anyone or tick anyone off, but I’ve written like Ms. Meyers.  I’d wager just about any writer worth their salt has.

It’s . . . too overt.  You’re too in the characters’ heads.  It’s all tell and no show (or, minimal show).

Maybe she gets better a couple books in.  I mentioned a couple days back going through some of my old college and just-post-college stuff.  What you see there is a lot like what she’s putting out there.  In shortest form: it doesn’t give any credit to the reader’s abilities to, um, read and comprehend.  It spells everything out.  There’s no subtlety to the text and while I can certainly see where some folks might get off on that, I think most folks are looking for something more.

Okay, /endrant

The Ricky Gervais thing is evey funnier — but in a less schadenfreude sort of fashion.

On his website, the star of the British The Office and Showtime’s Extras put up an open letter to US President Barack Obama.  Gervais doesn’t seem to have permalinks going on over there so, in the interest of keeping things accessible, I’ll do a little copy/pasting here for posterity and easier browsing:

An Open Letter to President Barack Obama

Dear Mr President,

Firstly, congratulations on your historic win. I have never been so behind a candidate for what must be considered the boss of the world.

You seem to be a man of grace and integrity, who would never shirk responsibility in any way.

I’ll get to the point.

As I’m sure you are aware, one of your flock has strayed. A Miss Paris Hilton, who is, I believe, a resident of Beverley Hills, is in England doing a reality game show for ITV2 called Paris Hilton’s British Best Friend. Fine. I have no problem with that. I don’t have to watch. But now it has come to my attention that she has bought a house in North London a few miles from me, and is out and about ingratiating herself with the Great British public.

Mr President. We are not stupid. This is clearly a retaliatory strike for Posh Spice moving to LA. I know it, and you know it, so let’s cut the “it’s a free country” nonsense and come to some agreement.

I propose an exchange.

This is how it would work. We call them both and tell them that we’ve found a giant “paparazzi nest”, in New York say. (half way home for both of them already)

At first they may be confused that they’d never heard of such a thing before, but the thought of that many photographers in one place will be irresistible.

Once we get them there, while they are having their photos taken (we will have hire a few guys with cameras to make it look good) we will swap their limos around. It’s fool proof.

This is a covert operation of which Mr Gordon Brown knows nothing. (I’ve got him working on finding a synthetic fur for The Queen’s guards’ bearskin hats.)

Have your people call my people. They may have to call a few times as my people are useless to be honest.

Thank you,

Ricky Gervais

Obama’s Inauguration in 1,474 MegapixelsPosted by dhoffman on January 24th, 2009

One of the interesting things about the internet is, sometimes, you come across something where you scratch your head, squint and try to figure out just how to explain what it is you’re linking.

This is one of those things.

In shortest form: it’s an amazing 1,474 megapixel photo of Barack Obama’s inauguration (all 2 million people present are in the shot, and you can zoom in to see their faces).

In long form . . . there’s this device called a “Gigapan Imager” which the photographer used along with a rail mounting system and a Canon G10 camera which allowed him to take 220 pictures and then, using the Gigapen software, stitch the 220 pictures togeter into the “Gigapan Panorama” I’m linking to you.

Here’s the site on the photographer’s home page.

And here it is at gigapan.com, where you can view it full-screen.

Set aside some time if you’re feeling voyeuristic.  There’s a lot to look at.

How I Made a 1,474-Megapixel Photo During President Obama’s Inaugural Address | David Bergman — ALL ACCESS — sports, concert, and music photographer.

Today is January 19th, 2009Posted by dhoffman on January 19th, 2009

I don’t know if this qualifies as “political” and certainly this isn’t that kind of blog (he says, equal parts jealous and relief), but I just can’t help myself.

This time tomorrow, we’ll have a new President.

It’s been a long eight years.  A looooooooong eight years.  More than once, it didn’t seem like it was ever going to end.

But here we are.

I spotted the following video, which I’ll embed, and though it’s not the sort of thing I’d usually truck in, I just can’t resist.

It’s Barack Obama’s keynote speech at the Democratic National Convention.  I remember hearing about it, then watching it, and the buzz that, “this guy’s going places.”

Well, yeah . . .

And, because I also cannot resist, and while it feels small of me to kick the guy when he’s down, part of me can’t help but think George W. Bush got up today, wiped his brow  and thought, “thank God it’s over.”

Yes, George.  Thank God it’s over (NSFW with some f-bombs in there):

Apologies if anyone’s offended by the presence of either video in a blog that’s, let’s face it, usually lite fair.  I promise, I’ll try not to let it happen again.

I Thought he went Home . . .Posted by dhoffman on December 19th, 2008

. . . so why do I keep getting emails from David Plouffe?

Seriously.

Jessy and I both gave money to Obama and, like any other donation, the second they have your money, they hit you for more money.  Okay, that’s fine (my car magnet still hasn’t arrived), but I thought David Plouffe, who ran Obama’s campaign, had stepped out of the spotlight and gone home to remind himself what his wife looked like (his joke, not mine).

No?

Maybe it’s spam.  Boy, wouldn’t that be something else?  When we gave, we gave by going to the website ourselves and not by clicking through a link in an email (something you should really, really, really never do (it’s like tasting the antifreeze to confirm that it’ll kill you).

Some of these emails have been surveys, or videos, but some of them are looking for donations again.  Why?  I thought I’d read that Obama broke records and all that for the money he brought in.  Is he still spending money campaigning?  Did they all forget to tell him he won?

Or, hey, maybe David Plouffe did go home, saw his wife (“ahhh, you cut your hair”) and now he’s bored.  We’ll know for sure when he starts sending out lolcats and offering to enlarge our penises.