The Powers of Matthew Star

I've been working my way through the entire series of The Powers of Matthew Star on YouTube. A kind soul posted it there for all the world to watch.

You should too. Skip the pilot and possibly you may want to miss out on the second half of the series, but definitely watch the first few episodes.

At the start of the series, the emphasis is on Matthew as an alien prince who was sent to Earth to grow up in safety when his world was invaded and is now waiting to go back to his own world and fight the intergalactic marauders. It's centered around his high school, his girlfriend Pam and his guardian and science teacher Walt Shepard (Louis Gossett Jr.)

Later on the school and Pam disappear and all Matt and Walt do is work assignments for some government agency.

I've even been inspired to do some writing.

"The Anglo Saxon race, sir, is a most surprising one."

So said Rev. Henry McNeal Turner on 3 September 1868, when the Georgia state legislature - of which, as a Representative, he was a member - expelled all of its black members. Turner was born in 1834 to free parents, but the law prevented the education even of free blacks. As a young teenager he got janitorial work at a law firm and, with the help of the lawyers who recognised his intelligence, managed to educate himself.

He became an African Methodist Church preacher in 1853 and travelled. After the US Civil War (1861-1865) broke out, he helped organise the First Regiment of U.S. Colored Troops (1863) and became an army chaplain.

In 1867 he helped organise the Republican Party in Georgia, served in the state's constitutional convention and was consequently elected to its House of Representatives, where he served until he and twenty-six other black legislators were expelled.

I have selected several quotes, BlackPast.org has a complete transcript.

Mr. Speaker: Before proceeding to argue this question upon its intrinsic merits, I wish the members of this House to understand the position that I take. I hold that I am a member of this body. Therefore, sir, I shall neither fawn nor cringe before any party, nor stoop to beg them for my rights.

I am here to demand my rights and to hurl thunderbolts at the men who would dare to cross the threshold of my manhood. There is an old aphorism which says, "fight the devil with fire," and if I should observe the rule in this instance, I wish gentlemen to understand that it is but fighting them with their own weapon.

The Anglo Saxon race, sir, is a most surprising one. No man has ever been more deceived in that race than I have been for the last three weeks. I was not aware that there was in the character of that race so much cowardice or so much pusillanimity. The treachery which has been exhibited in it by gentlemen belonging to that race has shaken my confidence in it more than anything that has come under my observation from the day of my birth.

If you deny my right the right of my constituents to have representation here because it is a "privilege," then, sir, I will show you that I have as many privileges as the whitest man on this floor. If I am not permitted to occupy a seat here, for the purpose of representing my constituents, I want to know how white men can be permitted to do so. How can a white man represent a colored constituency, if a colored man cannot do it?

We have pioneered civilization here; we have built up your country; we have worked in your fields and garnered your harvests for two hundred and fifty years! And what do we ask of you in return? Do we ask you for compensation for the sweat our fathers bore for you for the tears you have caused, and the hearts you have broken, and the lives you have curtailed, and the blood you have spilled? Do we ask retaliation? We ask it not. We are willing to let the dead past bury its dead; but we ask you, now for our rights.

Also:
New Georgia Encyclopedia article on Henry McNeal Turner
Titles by Henry McNeal Turner at Documenting the American South
Henry McNeal Turner on Wikipedia

rational recovery

My best friend, K., handed me this book this afternoon, called Rational Recovery. The New Cure for Substance Addiction and I read a LOT of it straight through. It sounds very tempting and he has the book, so he is at least thinking about doing something, which is a good thing. As opposed to AA, Rational Recovery (RR) puts the responsibility squarely on the shoulders of the addict. Given as we don't believe in any higher powers, Best Friend was never going to respond well to Alcoholics Anonymous.

Does anyone know about this? Is it any good?

My big fear is that, although he's read about it, he doesn't understand or doesn't really want to apply what he's read. I had a little 'discussion' with him after he said he wanted to quit in January. He kept coming up with reasons why he wouldn't quit now and I kept asking "Who is telling me this?"

I don't go out with him anymore, I don't give him any money (his ex already controls his finances and has him on an allowance), but I love him and you can't shut that off. He did kick his painkiller addiction, but as I've always said, that was really only a physical dependency (I say only...), the real problem is alcohol. And I worry for him.

Joe.My.Scientologist

Funny for an atheist like Joe. Although it's quite suspicious that the post below the one shown on my screen capture is actually one from almightygod himself:

map geekery

This afternoon at work I was suddenly overcome with a bout of map geekery inspired by xkcd.

This is part of the cartoon that set me off. Obviously I'm not going to spoil the fun for you here, you'll have to click and find out what it says about you.



As a result I am now in the possession of a stack of illegally printed A3 maps of the world in Equirectangular, Gall-Peters, Mercator, Goode homolosine, Kavrayskiy VII, Peirce quincunciual, Dymaxion, Van der Grinten and most elegantly of all - I think - Waterman butterfly projection.

All stolen from the Wikipedia list of map projections except for the Waterman, which is a bit of a drawback with Wikipedia. Also, if anyone knows of a high resolution version of a Cahill butterfly map other than the line drawings I've seen so far (or this funny fabric that allows you to sew globes) I'd very much appreciate it.

In a similar vein, here's a selection of map blogs I follow. Rather infrequently I must confess, but there are only so many hours in a day and all of you are just being too interesting on the internet for me to keep up.

Cartophilia: Maps and Map Memorabilia
The Map Scroll
Urban Cartography
Strange Maps