A Double, Neat -- 7/26/2012

* Google unveiled Google Fiber today, a revolutionary new breakfast cereal that promises to dethrone long-standing favorites like Fiber-One and Wheaties among the 55+ crowd and those women who appear in Activia commercials.

She's so happy she can't even...nevermind.

* Actually, Google Fiber is the United States' introduction to the kind of Internet the rest of the world has been enjoying for years.  There isn't even a way to make a joke about how fantastic it is going to be for gamers in Kansas City to be sniped by "god-damned camping assclowns" and no longer be able to blame it on lag.

In my day, all we had was a nuclear powered Pistol that could
 kill anyone at anytime from anywhere on the map.  It was the starting weapon.

* In fact, within hours of the announcement, home values in Missouri jumped almost a thousand percent (citation needed) and neighbors started complaining about the tech crowd that jumped down from their flying cars and immediately started buying everything in sight.  They relaxed, however, when it was revealed that Warren Buffet was the one financing the purchases, and he never screws people over, ever.

Artist's rendition of Kansas City real estate value.

A Double, Neat -- Quick Hits from Around the Internet

* Undoubtedly the next subject of the various "20 Tweets"-esque articles that have cropped up like particularly annoying fungi around the major Magic websites, the issue of "fake geeks" exploded on Twitter to the tune of about nine hours of conversation.  The "bad guys," as far as this subject is concerned, appear to be the anti-feminist "pretty girls" who have drawn the ire of "real geeks" by not actively memorizing the characters from the Star Wars EU or mastering the art of shouting louder during arguments about whether or not Iron Man could beat Batman in a fight.  Either that or the enemy is the exclusive geek crowd who refuse to believe someone can do geeky things in their spare time and still self-identify as a card-carrying TCG fan.  Or it's the inclusive geeks who don't mind seeing gorgeous women pretend to be interested in the same things that they are in order to feel attractive and desired.

Because every guy who watched this knows what Jimmy Choos are.

It may not be a popular opinion, but I happen to think that women that can hold a conversation with me about the use of conjugations in Tolkien's two Elvish languages are not actually figments of my imagination.  I also could not give less of a crap about whether or not anyone "sells out" in order to make a few dollars.  I can't believe this conversation is literally still going on as I write this.

* Cole Hamels received a $144 million dollar contract extension to remain with the Philadelphia Phillies, who announced, via a spokesperson, that the $80 million dollars they plan on paying just four players next year is actually Monopoly money, due to a cleverly worded proviso in the contract documents for Cliff Lee, Roy Holladay, Hamels, and Ryan Howard.  When asked to comment, Hamels remained silent, but his nephew brightened up, convinced that he would never again lose the game by having to pay his evil step-sister $20,000 for landing on Boardwalk.

* Kristen Stewart allegedly cheated on Robert Pattinson, which is heartbreaking to none of the people who care about this sort of thing since nearly all of them wanted Tinkerbell to be single so they could get back to fantasizing about glittery love-making with a few shades of bondage sprinkled in.  Sadly, when asked if he noticed a change in her demeanor that could have clued him in to her infidelity, Pattinson was forced to admit that, like the rest of us, he still isn't sure she even has a personality. "And, maybe, you know, it was another K-Stew, I'm pretty sure they make them in a factory somewhere," Robert did not add.

Decklists, Decklists Everywhere

Potting Soil:

4 Delver of Secrets
4 Quirion Dryad
4 Snapcaster Mage

12 Creatures

4 Gut Shot
4 Mutagenic Growth
4 Ponder
4 Mental Misstep
4 Vapor Snag
4 Mana Leak
4 Gitaxian Probe
2 Apostle's Blessing

26 Spells

4 Hinterland Harbor
3 Evolving Wilds
6 Island
3 Forest
2 Cavern of Souls

18 Lands

Sideboard:

3 Beast Within
1 Cavern of Souls
2 Talrand, Sky Summoner
1 Island
1 Forest
4 Devastation Tide
3 Temporal Mastery


Casablanca:

4 Restoration Angel
4 Snapcaster Mage
3 Thragtusk
4 Avacyn's Pilgrim
1 Phantasmal Image
2 Fiend Hunter
3 Cathedral Sanctifier

21 Creatures

4 Cloudshift
1 Ghostly Whispers
4 Ponder
2 Vapor Snag
3 Gut Shot
1 Beast Within

16 Spells

4 Cavern of Souls
3 Hinterland Harbor
1 Shimmering Grotto
1 Razorverge Thicket
3 Seachrome Coast
2 Sunpetal Grove
4 Forest
3 Island
2 Plains

23 Lands

Griselbrand's Vengeance: Modern Decklists

I don't normally like posting decklists out of context, as they tend to look very strange by themselves.  However, I'm making an exception in this case because of just how much fun it is to have Griselbrand in play on turn 2.  I will be following up with a few brief primers.


BRand:

4 Griselbrand

3 Kagemaro

4 Greater Gargadon

4 Demigod of Revenge

4 Simian Spirit Guide

19 Creatures

4 Goryo's Vengeance

4 Faithless Looting

4 Thoughtseize

1 Footsteps of the Goryo

1 Through the Breach

4 Sickening Shoal

18 Spells

4 Blood Crypt

1 Scalding Tarn

3 Verdant Catacombs

1 Dakmor Salvage

3 Graven Cairns

1 Lavaclaw Reaches

6 Swamp

4 Mountain

23 Land

Mono-Black Griselbrand's Vengeance

4 Griselbrand

4 Kagemaro, First to Suffer

4 Avatar of Discord

1 Hidden Horror

4 Demigod of Revenge

17 Creatures

4 Goryo's Vengeance

4 Thoughtseize

1 Inquisition of Kosilek

1 Footsteps of the Goryo

4 Sickening Shoal

2 Killing Wave

4 Liliana of the Veil

1 Darkblast

21 Spells

2 Dakmor Salvage

2 Tectonic Edge

3 Ghost Quarter

15 Swamp

Poem of the Day #4: Also, #5 and #6

A trip away from the pleasant glow of computer screens, accompanied only by an sadly wireless-less iPad and a growing sense of ennui left me unable to update for entirely too many hours.  Fortunately, no one seems to read these poems.  Still, 30 poems were promised, and 30 poems will be delivered.


#4

Whatever is begotten, born, and dies

Exists as a pleasant yet spiteful lie—

A smear on a window—

Fog on the sea—

Unchanged but always changing

Like a lie

Evolves in telling—

Always rearranging—

Until the truth at last resides—

Only in the

Honesty

Of fading, at last, to die.

#5

I take no sordid story with—

No tales of woe shall pass these lips—

When any ask who did I kiss

I shall speak only of fleeting bliss—

And tell them that I did love thee true

For that is all that I could do—

Though thou didst injure me

I would cause thee no injury.

Nor would I slander thy lovely name

Or spill ash over thy lonely grave—

When they ask who, I shall say 

That she is the beautiful Annabel Lee—

So, from now till the last break of day

Men and women whose hearts will fall

Can know the truth: love conquers all.

#6

Into the night we fly

On strong whispering wing

My memory touching yours

But never here—

We are always some other where—

Where they cannot come

We are together, you and I,

In the russet-clad evening sky,

The morning coming but the night young,

Making music with the moment

You grab and hold it

I struggle not to let go

But I cannot hold because though 

We fly so high above everything

We fly with thick, heavy, lead-filled wings

Burdened by the brevity of the past and the longevity of the future—

We cannot be together while we are held apart

By the force of ten thousand parting words

So we fall back down to Earth—

Two soaring, yet Icarian birds.