The internet is a truly strange beast, causing all manner of surreal happenings.  Lately many these happenings have been made aware to me via Twitter.

One such example:

The other day I myself was wondering aloud at what strange times these are in which we are living; that I can now see real-time thoughts from cool people that I dig pouring through my computer (and/or hand-held port-o-phone device) mere milliseconds after said cool person typed them.  I mean, I’m sitting here at the computer bored…  and so, apparently, is Henry Rollins.  And Stephen Colbert. Crazy.  At the time that I was musing about the surreality of it all, Warren Ellis and Ben Templesmith were sending humorous in-jokes back and forth betwixt themselves, when lo and behold, from out of the blue, I see Wil Wheaton proclaiming the wonder of these times that allow for him to be in line at a comic shop purchasing Fell #9 and seeing real-time quips between the afore-mentioned creators of said comic book. His mind being blown added extra force to my own mind’s blowal.

Then the other day Ben Templesmith boggled my mind by announcing that he’d finished the trade paperback of a book that hasn’t even finished its run in floppies yet.  I mean, I KNOW that that’s how the publishing world works, but to hear Ben himself commenting upon it between the caffeine pills and and the jar of faux-urine is mind-bending.

Know what else is mind-bending? Having Warren Ellis respond personally to something you asked. —Oh! just now Wil Wheaton declared that everyone needs to stop, for it is Hammer Time, but was shut down when Warren Ellis declared that it is NEVER Hammer Time.  Ouch.

And thus ends this installment of “what are the nerds that I love up to on Twitter today?”  I still don’t understand Twitter, but I’m apparently addicted to it.

Defined tags for this entry: ben templesmith, mind-blowing, nerds, surreal, twitter, warren ellis, wil wheaton

On Saturday afternoon, D and I went to Target to pick up a wrist brace to help alleviate her post-knee-surgery pain. While she was looking at braces, I wandered over to the videogame section, where I encountered three 30-something guys who were all wearing Bluetooth ear-dongle thingies. All showed signs of being socially inept (in addition, I mean, to the aforementioned Bluetooth ear dongles, which are a pretty good sign right there), such as improper use of their “outside voices,” poor sharing skills (“lemme see that,” yank!), and gratuitous use of the words “dude” and “awesome.” In short, the socially inept can smell their own kind.

I couldn’t tell whether they were all talking to each other, all having individual phone conversations, or all in one major conference call, but they were all talking the whole time. What I could tell, though, is that they all spent a lot of time with video games, and didn’t have a lot of time left over for grooming or laundry.

While D was paying for her brace, I had the opportunity to see what they were buying. Here’s the list:

One copy of World of Warcraft,
One large bottle of Tylenol P.M.,
One twelve pack of Zest brand bar bath soap.

I’m not sure what they had planned, but doesn’t it sound like they were in for one heck of a Saturday night?

Defined tags for this entry: geeky, happenings, nerds, video games