All Things Venomous Part 5

As I am writing this, I am looking up snakes on the internet. I am having trouble finding a good snake site that lists snakes by location. For example, I wanted to find out about snakes in China. I did a search for venomous snakes of China. The third site listed is a transcription of a lecture about the venomous snakes of Australia. Ummm, cool, but not quite. Would somebody please make a site containing all the information I want? It is hard enough coming up with snake jokes without having to actually WORK to find information. Jeez.

Somebody should make a site called VenomousThingsNotToBeBittenBy.com. I would bookmark it and visit daily, just to ensure that I could avoid all the creatures they listed.

And next, possibly the most venomous place in the world: Australia!

All Things Venomous Part 4

And then there is India. The first thing I think of when I think of India is COBRA. I do not mean the silly, amazingly ineffectual, yet possessing staggering wealth, manpower, and resources GI Joe villains, but real, honest-to-goodness, bite-you-in-the-kneecap, snakes.

I just do not get Cobra (the villains, not the snakes). How did they amass such wealth and power when they are continually defeated by three or four members (tops) of GI Joe? They have an army large enough to take on NATO, yet cannot use the restroom with out having to parachute out when it blows up. Seriously.

Anyway, cobras (the snakes, not the villains). The only thing I know about cobras comes from Rikki-Tikki-Tavi, wherein the hero, a mongoose named Rikki-Tikki defeats the evil cobras Nag and Nagaina. I will admit this is a highly biased viewpoint and that not all cobras are evil. I am sure most cobras are perfectly nice once you get to know them and that Nag and Nagaina are not representative of their species. Nag and Nagaina are obviously the Manson family of the breed (Charles, not Marilyn).

Some cobras spit venom. I assume these are juveniles, who like to hang out in front of 7-11s and try to get older snakes to buy them beer. Maybe not. So, cobras. Big snakes. Hoods. Venomous. Spitting. Moving on.

Next: Snakes on the Internet!

All Things Venomous Part 3

Africa also has the Black Mamba. Do not snicker. The Black Mamba is eight feet long (approx. 70,000.3 meters), dusty brown snake with amazingly potent venom. It is also the fastest snake in the world (12.5 mph, 40 mph if it has to go to the bathroom). It gets its name from the inside of its mouth, which is all black. Mambas are notoriously aggressive, sort of like the snake version of cell phone salesman.

Imagine you are walking through the scrubland (mall), minding your own business, perhaps checking out the gazelles (window shopping), when you inadvertently stray into Mamba (Cell Phone Salesman) territory. You freeze, hoping the cold-blooded predator has not noticed you (the salesman, though the snake also counts), but it is too late. The salesman lunges, shouting something about comparative rates. Your only hope is to grab the person next to you and throw them at the salesman, hoping to distract him, and then run.

In an ideal world, you would distract the salesman with an actual Black Mamba. The salesman would die from the snake venom, but the Mamba would end up with exorbitant cell phone rates. I do not know which is worse.

Up next, India!

All Things Venomous Part 2

Africa is chock-full of deadly creatures with colorful names. The Boomslang is a snake that likes to sit in trees, presumably so it can bite you in the ear when you walk by. The one they showed was a bright, almost neon green. It was an amazingly beautiful reptile, which should be of some small consolation when it launches itself at your head, screaming. People at your funeral will comment on this.

It is a shame he died.

Yes, but what a lovely snake!

Indeed. Pity they could not remove it.

Frankly, if you have to die from a snake bite, it might as well be from an attractive snake. Would you rather get run over by a Ferrari or an AMC Gremlin? I thought so.

Next: More Africa!

All Things Venomous Part 1

I am glad I live in the US. This is not for the usual reasons, but simply because there is a marked lack of venomous things that will kill you. You see, I occasionally watch the Animal and Discovery Channels and have learned that the rest of the world is full of creatures that are amazingly, incredibly dangerous.

Vietnam, for example, has something like 31 species of snakes. 29 of which are poisonous. Do not quote me on this (actually, go ahead, I will never know), as I was busy checking under my sofa for cobras when this was mentioned. I did not find any cobras, though I did find a dust bunny. I beat it to death with a mace, just to be safe.

Yes, I own a mace.

Now, some of you may think that I do not like snakes. Let me say that I do not hate snakes. I do not particularly like them either. I have a live-and-please-do-not-bite-me attitude as far as they are concerned.

I have known a number of people that had pet snakes and I do not get that. Snakes do not have feelings and cannot love you. I do not care if you kiss it on the snout and call it Pookey-Bear. To the snake, you are simply a meal that is currently too large to eat. Think about it. What if you were the pet of a giant, 20-foot hamburger? You would not spend your days scampering around its feet. You would instead simply want to eat it. If you are a vegan or vegetarian, insert the appropriate 20-foot foodstuff to complete the metaphor.

Tune in tomorrow for Part 2 to learn about Africa and the various things there that will kill you.

Another Spider-Man 3 review! No spoilers!

So, my wife Laura and I went to see Spider-Man 3 last night, and since I now have a website with a blog, I figure I am obligated to tell the world my opinion. I kind of view this as a right of internet passage. I dont want to give out spoilers because it is still opening week, so I cant get into specifics on exactly how I felt about specific scenes or plot points but I will say that we very much enjoyed the ride. Laura and I go to fewer and fewer opening weeks nowadays because of crowded theaters, squirming kids, teens playing text tag with cell phones. You know the drill. Not to mention Netflicks has us spoiled at this point. Basically nowadays when I do go out to a movie I ask myself some simple questions.

Q: Did this film have things in it I didnt like so much?
A: Of course it did.
Q: Did it have stuff I did like?
A: Yup.
Q: Was the stuff I liked enough to make me forget or ignore the stuff I didnt like?
A: Yup.
Yay! That means I liked it!

Im a long time comics fan. If it werent for comics I never would have learned how to read. The first comic I ever bought and paid for by myself was Marvel Team-Up Starring Spider-Man issue 24 with Brother Voodoo back in 1974. Ive also been a fan of Sam Raimi since I first saw Evil Dead 2 (which I saw before the original). Ive learned over the years to make lots of allowances for theatrical releases not being quite what I remember in my comics, and I am a happier movie viewer as a result. Ive worked in computer games now for over 12 years, and although life in games isnt quite the same as in the movie industry Ive seen how hard it can be to deal with licensed titles, and how sacrifices get made for the sake of story and medium,.. yadda, yadda, yadda. Ive given up arguing about how easy or hard it is to capture a comic in movie or any other form. Now I just put on my +2 hat of “Its just a movie, not your childhood” and try to enjoy them each for what they are. I think Sam Raimi has done a fair job translating Spidey to the screen so far. Still I have to admit I was pretty scared going in that this film would suffer from too many villains and too many plot points, as (in my humble opinion) many other superhero franchises have in the past. I was somewhat relieved at how these things were handled in Spider-Man 3. Again, I wont tell folks how things were handled because the web is filled with enough spoilers already.

To me it was definitely worth the watching. Go see it.

Leigh

Breaking Sheep

You may be among the 3 people in the world who do not play World of Warcraft and so do not get the reference. The Mage class has a spell called Sheep. This turns an enemy into, you guessed it, a sheep. This effectively keeps the critter out of combat and makes it easier to battle large groups. Sheep has a limited duration and can be broken if the Sheeped enemy takes damage. Breaking Sheep is obviously quite bad and can get everyone killed.

I have a regular Tuesday night WoW group and we run 5-man instances (encounters designed for a team of 5 people). We have a good group (Warrior, Mage, Cleric, Shaman, and Rogue (me)) and in general are pretty efficient. I Sap (stun) one enemy, the Warrior pulls the mobs, the Mage Sheeps and we kill the rest. However, a few games ago, whilst questing through Zul-Farrak there was a whole string of sheeps being broken.

Generally, we are a finely honed killing machine, plowing through dungeons without any real problems save for the occasional tough boss. We are rarely threatened, rarely really challenged. We are just too efficient. However, when the sheeps were broken, things got interesting. The Mage was running in circles, the Warrior was trying to get agro, the Cleric was keeping the Mage alive, the Shaman was trying to figure out who to hit and I was backstabbing anything that got near the Cleric. It was chaotic, confusing, and several other words beginning with C.

It was fun. It was really fun.

We were in danger. We were threatened. Foul language was used. We persevered. We summoned Gahz-Rillah and kicked his butt. We won.

Later, I was chatting with one of the other players about the game. We agreed that breaking sheep was bad. We discussed what when wrong. We considered. We pondered. We both admitted we had a lot of fun. Maybe breaking sheep every once in a while is not such a bad thing.

Cheers,
-Jason