Dork Geek Nerd: October 2022

Mulling over words again

In cricket, a mullygrubber (or simply grubber) is a delivery that, whether intentionally or accidentally, travels more along the ground than through the air. It's fair to say they are despised by batsmen.

"Mulligrubs" was an Aussie TV show for little kids that I recall my youngest sisters watching, and which centred on a disturbing disembodied face. With a disturbing high-pitched voice to boot!

I tried to brainstorm a third similar word. Rule Of Three and all that. Best I could do was mull - a nickname for marijuana where I grew up. Now, I'm picturing a stoner chuckling at "Mulligrubs".

Recent viewing

"A Late Style..." only if you're into literary bios and/or poetry. Then it's above average. "Iron Fists" is a SUPERB doco about the influence of Hong Kong martial-arts movies on the rest of the world. They cover everything and speak to everyone. "Exorcism" is so-so, being ultimately locked into the formula of the horror flicks it semi-spoofs. "Perfumes" is a sweet (geddit?), typically unusual French drama about a former star perfumier thrown together with a limo driver also struggling in life. Second Frenchie for this week, "Un Triomphe" is the true tale of an actor-turned-teacher attempting to put on a professional production of "Waiting For Godot" using prison inmates. Where that journey takes them all is truly astounding. Murder mystery "The Cat..." (1978), while ridiculous on more than one level, is still superior to modern equivalents like "Knives Out".

[Seen on: Kanopy x2, Prime, Kanopy x2, Prime.]

Life's too short to spectate on neutral teams

I was horrified to learn from my buddy JK that when, as a grad student, he'd worked in a Melbourne nightclub collecting glasses, no matter where they were found - even sitting in the trough or floating in a toilet bowl - they would be chucked into the dishwasher and returned to circulation. Sometimes it's better not to know.

When I attended my first science-fiction club meeting in the '90s, the organisers ran a game using a cassette player where you had to identify minor characters from sci-fi telly *by voice*. How does this relate to the previous paragraph? I did so poorly they gave me a consolation prize. Sometimes it's better not to know.

What did I win? One of the admins went to their prize cupboard and brought forth a paperback copy of the 1989 anthology "Foundation's Friends", which featured a stellar cast of authors writing in Asimov's Foundation Universe. I was stoked! I went straight to a nightclub for a celebratory beverage...possibly.

Generation skipping

My friend JH has a large collection of modern "Star Wars" figures. He was telling me that his son, a young teen, has never shown any real interest in them - much to J.'s disappointment.

I can relate. A couple of Christmases ago, I introduced one of my nephews to solo gamebooks, of which I have an entire bookcase full. He read for a while and seemed absorbed in the quest. But he didn't finish it, so I asked his mum (sister EM) to ask him privately if he'd like to take the book home. The reply came back, "Nah, that's OK."

I'm sure I could think of further examples, only I'm keen to go and watch "The Power Of The Doctor". Actually, none of the next gen in my fam are much into "Doc Who", either :-(

They must be taken in hand

There was a period during my teenage years when our "D&D" game was mostly DM-ed by BP. Unfortunately for him, the rest of us would often stray from our character alignments and commit theft, vandalism and even murder around the medieval-fantasy towns of his gameworld. It got so bad, in fact, that he created a subclass of Forensic Mages, with their own spells such as Detect Murder Weapon. The existence of these detectives-by-another-name didn't completely deter us from deviant behaviour, but it did usually see wayward charas brought to justice sooner. I'd love to reread all of that information now. I can still picture it - pages of handwritten text that had flowed from a uniquely brilliant mind.

Recent viewing

Two thumbs up for "The Sound Of 007". "The Dig" is nicey-nice and interesting and a story that deserved to be told. "National Treasure 1" holds up well. "N/T/2" doesn't. "Freshman Year" is talky, angsty teen fare, if you're in the mood for that. "Breach" sucks. Needs to go in the bin.

[Seen on: Prime, Netflix, Disney+ x2, Kanopy, Prime.]

Brain strain

On top of "University Challenge", "Only Connect" and "Mastermind" (UK), I'm now regularly playing along with "Brain Of Britain 2022". The 12 heats of "B/O/B" are over and it's time for the finals.

My scores for those dozen qualifying episodes were: 10, 17, 10, 10, 9, 14, 13, 12, 12, 15, 12, 14. Which is an average of 12.33 correct answers per ep.

I usually felt like I'd done better than 2-3 of the four contestants, but I was always humbled by at least one of them. Then again, even Gail Trimble - remembered for perhaps the greatest "Uni Challenge" performance ever - didn't manage to win her heat. (She may sneak through to the next round as a high-scoring loser. I didn't pay attention to that aspect of the heats.)

"Brain Of Britain" is an easygoing affair. In the 12th episode, there was a question on who had written a trio of named F/SF novels. "That would be the beautiful Tanith Lee," answered the contestant, correctly and amusingly. "The beautiful Tanith Lee," echoed the host.

Street art - Part 2

As you can tell from the angles of certain pics, I had to squeeze into an alley to snap 'em.

Street art - Part 1

Took a masked mosey around my city to photograph some (mostly) new street art.

Recent viewing

The posters below are in alphabetical order. They are also, by an amazing coinky-dink, in the order of how highly I rated the corresponding films - from most to least.

[Seen on: Netflix, Foxtel, Prime, Prime, Netflix, Kanopy, Prime.]

Just beet it

Once, back when I was working in the same office as PG, he declared he had a craving for beetroot. Since I was planning to walk to the nearby cafe and grab a juice, I offered to get him a beetroot sandwich.

"Yes, please."

Unsurprisingly, such a thing wasn't on the menu, but I knew they had beetroot for their hamburgers. I asked the cafe lady if she'd put some on a sanger, explaining that my workmate was craving the stuff.

Not only did she say yes, she told me her mum had made her beetroot sandwiches - white bread, lots of margarine - all the time as a kid. She was clearly chuffed to have the chance to do the same for someone else.

So PG got his food fix and the lady got to relive a happy memory :-)

--

While typing the above, I recalled that beetroot sandwiches featured in the "Adrian Mole" books by Sue Townsend. Bert Baxter, the old-age pensioner who AM helps out, is fond of eating them - leading to a lot of clothing stains (and a lot of bitching about said stains).

Could you live on beetroot sandwiches like BB? Probably not, but beetroot *is* pretty good for you, containing carbohydrates, protein, folate, manganese and more. Like many naturally dark-coloured foods, it's considered heart-healthy.

"Goonies" not-sequels

There's never been a true sequel to beloved 1985 adventure-comedy flick "The Goonies". I doubt there ever will be, unless it's done as a cartoon. However, there have been not-sequels. Here are just a few...

Best known, of course, is the old Konami videogame boldly, incorrectly titled "The Goonies II". It sees Mikey having to rescue the rest of the gang, plus a mermaid(!) named Annie.

Podcast "Seen The Sequel?" presented their idea for a follow-up in a 2020 episode. They suggested the same actors could play adult versions of their characters, searching for Mikey, who has gone missing while obsessively tracking One-Eyed Willy's pirate ship, Inferno. I won't reveal any more as it's quite a fun listen.

Then there's the "Under The Goondocks" expansion for Funko's boardgame based on "The Goonies". I own the latter but not yet the former. Anyway, this continuation has Andy, Brand and Stef racing spoilt rich kid Troy to the unclaimed treasures in the cavern network beneath Astoria - and reportedly meeting new foes.

Recent viewing

"Blood Simple" was a gap in my cinema knowledge. Nasty business! With "Miss Peregrine's...", I'd read the graphic novel once while at sister AK's place. Sweet fairytale. Had also read the Robert Harris book on which historical thriller "Munich" is based. Dunno why I waited so long to view "Rush" (2013). If you're into motor racing, it's effing sensational. And I loved that it wasn't so much hero vs villain as antihero vs antihero. That Ron Howard can direct the shiz out of a movie, can't he? "Ouistreham" - aka "Between Two Worlds" - is a powerful, affecting, not-without-moments-of-joy portrait of people whose situation/opportunities in life mean a minimum-wage job is maybe the best they can hope to achieve. I sometimes think I should just watch French films.