20 September 2013

Birthdays
Spencer Lock b. 1991 (Resident Evil)
Charlie Weber b. 1978 (Buffy)
Moon Bloodgood b. 1975 (Terminator Salvation)
N’Bushe Wright b. 1970 (Blade)
Ben Edlund (writer, Angel, The Tick)
Kristen Johnson b. 1967 (Third Rock from the Sun)
Michael Hurst b. 1957 (Hercules, Xena)
Brinke Stevens b. 1954 (Bad Girls From Mars)
Steve Gerber b. 1947 died 10 February 2008 (writer, Man-Thing, Howard the Duck)
George R.R. Martin b. 1946 (The Song of Ice and Fire)

Any of the actresses on the list meets the Cute Girl criterion for the Picture Slot, but I'm handing it to the guy who is the best known name on the list as of 2013, George R.R. Martin. I'm a bit surprised that none of the books in the series that is the basis for Games of Thrones has yet won a Hugo or Nebula, but I get the feeling he'll get one or maybe both when the next one comes out, given how much the popularity of the books has been enhanced by the TV series.

I was not aware until I researched this that Steve Gerber was dead. I really liked the Howard the Duck comic books, but the movie was one of the biggest missteps of George Lucas' career, and that's saying something.

Many happy returns to the living on the list.

Holiday
Unification Day. In the universe of Firefly and Serenity, this is the day that celebrates the end of the long civil war. My main problem with this is that the people in the new solar system would probably would have to redefine a year based on the orbits of the various planets in the system.

In the year 2000!

Prediction: Planes will be used in battle to drop bombs on the enemy.

Predictor: One of the series of French postcards released in the decade of the 1900s

Reality: I'm guessing this artist's rendering is done pre-Kitty Hawk, so the design of the plane is not actually a thing that could get airborne, but this is the most accurate of all the ideas the German and French postcards had about what we would do once heavier than air flight was possible. The high ground has been understood as an advantage in battle for a very long time, and planes take that height advantage one step further.

Looking one day ahead... INTO THE FUTURE!

On Saturdays, we travel back to 1893 to see what they thought 1993 would look like. Tomorrow we'll hear from labor leader James William Sullivan.

Join us then... IN THE FUTURE!