2 posts tagged “geek”

Instead of

• cleaning my room
• writing one of 5 papers I have due in as many days

• reading the growing stack of books and articles that would, ostensibly, help me write those aforementioned papers
• transcribing any number of interviews from back in October

• working on any of several features pieces for Destructoid that are currently clogging up my Google Docs docket
• honey-doing my way through a long list of errands
  
• or, heaven the fuck forbid, actually playing video games

I've been playing with my new computer. I haven't actually done anything productive with it, mind you, but I do have it adequately personalized and shiny-looking. Like some kind of new-age, Bauhausian minimalist, I've managed to reduce my desktop to nothing but this image: The computer that has replaced the one lost in The Wreck is a Dell XPS M1530 with a 100 GB harddrive, an Intel Core 2 Duo CPU T5450 @ 1.67 Ghz, 2.05 GB of RAM, and an NVIDIA video card, for which I can't find the specs right now. Much like the moonspeak accompanying Frosty-san, I can't actually say that I know what half of those words actually mean, but I do know that they are a verifiable, tangible calculation of my e-peen. Of course.

Like a small child on Christmas day, the implications associated with my new toy are vastly overshadowed by how fucking cool it is; which is another way of saying that I haven't come to terms with the sizable dent in my point-mass pocketbook. 

While studying for my for my Astronomy exam (P.S. I helped discover a fucking comet!), I came across a star named Thuban, in the constellation Draco. With my encyclopedic knowledge of Final Fantasy X -- I played it for 173 hours; I ought to know something -- I remembered that this was also the name of the last, terrifying optional boss in the Arena. I had a suspicion that the names of celestial beings might pre-date 2001, so I went searching.

And what do you know -- Thuban is the Arabic word for "dragon!" And it's the constellation Draco! Thuban is a Chinese Meth Dragon!* My connections, let me show you them!

Anyway, I've strayed significantly from the topic of this post: how did I found out what a Thuban was? The T entry in the myth alphabet book. Not only was it informative and interesting, but it was accompanied by this stellar image:

I love this so hard. I'm glad that whoever chose to compile this didn't use the same old Greek and Roman and Norse gods and chose to mix it up. Most of these are Slavic, Eastern, or Irish -- a refreshing change from Ares and Thor. I mean, you guys are cool and all, but Kevin Sorbo isn't. Not only are these really cool, indie, low-fi deities, but they're all accompanied by fantastic artwork, each featuring the cutest amorphous blobthing I've ever seen. Seriously, take 15 minutes and scroll through all of these.

Unfortunately, there's no author information to be found, so I don't know where to mail the handjobs and the human sacrifices. That's really about the nicest thing I can say about a serendipitous find. It's just so good.

*There is some speculation that the actual phrase is "Chinese Myth Dragon" but Dragonite smokes hella meth, and you all know it.