Dispatches from the Cultural Frontier

Cool title - which is code for "Mark wants to write about a bunch of little things & just shoved 'em into a single post". Read on!

Tait + Taylor - Furler = Who Knows?!

Michael Tait is the new lead singer for the Newsboys... wow. Well, it's not like they haven't switched lineups & lead singers before - but bringing Tait onboard is an interesting twist. According to Wikipedia, they've got a new album coming out in May that Steve Taylor had a hand in, writing several songs & even singing on one of them.

If you don't know who I'm talking about, it's the CCM equivalent of George Michael taking over the lead vocal duties of Genesis from Phil Collins - who took them over from Peter Gabriel back in the day... and then having the love child of Weird Al & The Clash come and work on your new record. If you do know who I'm talking about, discuss how good my analogy is in the comments - yes, I'm talking to you, Zionred & Nord.

Rebel is...

My prediction: on Heroes, Rebel is Micah Sanders - the technology kid.

And here's my reasons why:

1. We haven't seen him for a long time.
2. There's the whole "I can manipulate tech" superpower.
3. His mom's not around anymore to do stupid things that could endanger his life.
4. He's got a cousin who can protect him while he's all wrapped up in the cyberworld.
5. The only other character I can think of that might fit is Hana, and according to the webcomic she no longer has an actual body.

Rhino Is My Hero

The kids saw Bolt again at the "cheap" theater on Friday. (BTW, didn't these used to be called "dollar theaters"? It was $3/person, which is decent compared to getting yammed by the regular-priced theaters.) It comes out on DVD tomorrow. "(It's) beyond awesome! (it's)... be-awesome!"

Best quote... a network suit gives the Truman Show-esque director of Bolt's TV show a dose of reality: "The show's too predictable. The girl's in danger, the dog saves her from the creepy english guy, we get it. There's always a happy ending. And our focus groups tell us 18 to 35 year olds are unhappy. They're not happy with happy." Ahem... can anyone say, "This explains why comic books read like they do right now?!"

Must... Read... Rules... Closer...

Found two different games this last week that I've been playing incorrectly... and I'm the one who read/taught the rules:

1. Strozzi: didn't catch the exception that you can't park more than one boat per player per port - makes the game tighter.
2. Der Schwarze Pirat - Das Duell: made a bad assumption that ships are returned to the harbor when they're hit... they aren't. The way we played it when I screwed it up made the game last just short of forever. The right rules make it a lot of fun - portable The Black Pirat with the added bonus of firing a tiny wooden air cannon.