Messages

Also submitted, for the board's approval, Phil Manzanera, Lenny Kaye and Johnny Marr.

--Grant

I bought "Refugees" by the Tears Saturday morning.  Great God!  What an amazing single - did it chart well?

--Grant

That's all right, Conexus, I can dislike Slaine and Pratchett in equal measures just fine right now.

I make no apologies for either loving Samantha Slade or having my own opinions, and if the Hive Mind is so cold and heartless as to read The Davinchy Code without a giant smile on its zombie-like visage, then it would do well not to bother assimilating me.

--Grant

I've looked over the top 20s in every category and can only declare the Hive Mind to be wrong, wrong, wrong in everything but games, comics and magazines.

Really, how can the Hive Mind stand to have Terry Pratchett in the top 10 and neither To Kill a Mockingbird nor The Scarlet Letter in the top 20?

--Grant

That was **wonderful**, every bit as great as Doctor Who should be!!

--Grant

Considering this fellow isn't dressed as Batman and is wanted for the murder of his girlfriend last week, I'd say no...  :-D

--Grant

As readers can see from this story (http://www.11alive.com/news/news_article.aspx?storyid=63711 , link good as of 9.30 am EST 5/27/05), Atlanta is in the third day of a traffic nightmare.  About forty hours ago, a suspected murderer from Florida climbed up a construction crane in Buckhead, which you might think of as the city's financial district.

Showing the remarkable ingenuity which has made our city a planet-wide legend in police work, the cops have closed down two blocks of Peachtree Road, the central artery through the city, as immortalized by Elton John, who lives here, on his last album.  The gridlock is simply unbelievable, even for a traffic nightmare like this city is regularly, costing area merchants thousands as people avoid the area.  Even Lenox Square, a giant, posh mall about a mile north of the area, is affected.

Further combatting the menace, the police keep swooping a helicopter down and blasting loud music to keep him awake while they bellow at him from a megaphone to come down peacefully.  Consequently, nobody in nearby apartments and homes are getting any sleep either.

And all I can think is, "Man, Judge Dredd would have taken care of this problem ages ago..."

"You've got one minute to climb down that crane, creep, or else you're coming down in a bag!"

--Grant

Link: http://www.11alive.com/news/news_article.aspx?storyid=63711" target="_blank">Just SHOOT him!

Ah, and I was looking forward to seeing that Chickenhead mutie from that McMahon annual story again...!

--Grant

It is.  Four new stories in that one (ROBO-HUNTER, YAYYY!!), with Breathing Space starting in 1451.

--Grant

Huh.  Poor Breathing Space was pushed back again!  It was solicited to Diamond as starting in 1441...

But never mind!  New Stronty, new Robo-Hunter (makes loud, happy noises!!!) and Leatherjack *does* start in prog 1450.  Considering how poorly I'm doing in fantasy football, it's nice to have had one prediction right.

--Grant

I'm with Rowdy Golk Block!  Who you fighting with?!

Is this one of these occasions where I should be *reeeeeally* glad that I'm totally clueless about what new pop culture juggernaut is driving right-thinking Brits mad?

--Grant

Well, you've hit upon the precise issue I have with Shakara.  It's really, *really* cool, but there's nothing to it.  The plot structure is very repetitious, by design, and not very much of ongoing consequence happens, but it's astonishingly fun to pore over.

--Grant

Sometimes, just the "shock of the new" is enough to kickstart the prog into being fantastic again.  I'm only up to prog 1436, so I might not have experienced the full Slaine/VCs hangover you're having in the UK right now, but words just don't convey how pleased I am to see the end of Nikolai Dante.  This simply wouldn't feel so tired and annoying if John Burns wasn't drawing it.

The next four weeks of progs still look pretty good to me.  I like Bec & Kawl and I'm enjoying American Gothic and I rarely dislike Dredd, so 3/5 of the progs you've seen but I haven't look pretty good.  Then we've got Shakara and Breathing Space and Cabs, all of which I'm really looking forward to.  And Leatherjack, which is about 10 weeks away, I think...

Anyway, the collected editions are nice to have and they can be fantastic reads on their own, but for my money, nothing beats getting new thrill-power every couple of weeks from my local comic shop.

--Grant

Link: http://www.2000ad.org/thrillpower" target="_blank">Touched by the Hand of Tharg

I always read Garp with a sharp southern Alabama twang, myself.  His dialogue is so dense that speaking it in a Texan drawl would take him hours.

--Grant