Saturday, December 27, 2008

Gallifrey 2009 Guest Update

I guess the convention gods were reading this blog when I whinged and moaned about how the Chicago TARDIS schedule didn't allow me to see more of Colin Baker. The following is the guest announcement made by the fine people that run Gallifrey a few days ago. I sense a good friend of mine will be staying up late at night trying to figure out what to get autographed. ;)

Gallifrey Conventions is delighted to make a major announcement about two new guests for our 2009 convention:

We are extremely pleased to welcome back the Sixth Doctor, COLIN BAKER. Colin is a special sponsored guest being brought over by Alien Entertainment, a major dealer of Doctor Who memorabilia, as well as the sponsors of our annual sister convention ChicagoTARDIS and the official North American distributor of Big Finish Productions audios. Colin Baker, who played the Doctor from 1984-1986, has been with us several times in the past, and is being sponsored by Alien Entertainment for a trip to Los Angeles to help promote the Big Finish audio series. As such, he'll be signing in the dealers room at the Alien Entertainment table. However, Colin *will* be participating in the rest of the Gallifrey 2009 convention... including a panel that reunites him with his co-star Nicola Bryant (Peri) for the first time at a US convention in many years.

Meanwhile, it is our pleasure to welcome for his first North American convention actor KAI OWEN, in a visit sponsored by Tenth Planet Events. Kai is familiar to current audiences from his role as Rhys Williams, the husband of Gwen Cooper on Torchwood, who is a recurring regular on the series and whose role was expanded
during the second season. Kai Owen has also appeared on stage and in such productions as "Casualty" and "Rocket Man" as well as productions for Welsh television. Tenth Planet Events, who are long-time
dealers in the Gallifrey One dealers room, will be hosting the actor for autographs at their table; Owen will also appear on stage on several panels, including together with actor Gareth David Lloyd (Ianto).

Additionally, some very good news: GARY RUSSELL will be at Gallifrey 2009 after all! The long-time writer/producer and friend of Gallifrey One had to cancel out due to his responsibilities on Doctor Who's 2009 schedule, but has been able to make some time to get to Los Angeles after all. And STEVE ROBERTS

of the Doctor Who Restoration Team will be joining us for panels, including a look at the current and forthcoming slate of BBC Doctor Who DVDs for 2009.

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Wednesday, December 17, 2008

Chicago TARDIS 2008 - Day Six

Monday finds me praying for the sweet release of death.

Normally I do not get hangovers when I drink. Apparently my body decided the day I was to start my drive back to Houston would be a good time to have one. Oddly enough my body likes to do that. The last major hangover I had came after a night of drinking in New Orleans at a Squeeze show where I lost count after screwdriver number six in an attempt to keep up with the locals and the British fans. Many early morning hours were spent wrapped around the Porcelain God but I had to a get back on the road to head to Austin to see the band again. Insert a bit of my vision going just as I got off the causeway, not making it to the Waffle House in time and therefore hanging my head out of my car window to throw up along with a two hour nap in an Exxon parking lot and that would sum up my return trip in that instance.

You remember that scene from Ferris Bueller's Day Off where Cameron is in his bedroom and Ferris is trying to convince him to skip school? The part where he's laying there in the dark, singing "When Cameron was in Egypt's land"? That was me Monday morning. Except without the singing because that would've hurt too much. As it was I had to beg John and Dan to stop making me laugh because that was putting me perilously close to puking my guts out. Unlike my New Orleans trip solids did not pass through my lips in the wrong direction, but it took me a long time to become functional.

John and Dan left for the airport around ten and I just hung around the lobby trying to regain my faculties. I was almost gifted a bunch of booze but that hand off never happened. I also got invited to dinner which I had to naturally turn down.

I finally headed out around eleven, wishing old and new friends safe flights. It had snowed most of the night so while the roads were relatively clear it was still slow going. Things were not helped by the public works department deciding they didn't need to clean the road signs. This means I went the wrong way on the turnpike and spent a good thirty minutes trying to go the right way. All I'll really say about the trip back is that I'll never drive through Oklahoma again. That nearly broke me and I ended up sleeping a few hours in a gas station parking lot to get my head back on straight. I eventually made it back into Houston around three in the afternoon on Tuesday.

Much love has to be given to my roommates, John and Dan. I don't think the convention would've been half as fun if they hadn't made it out. Fine me on Facebook and see how much fun we all had in visual form.

India Fisher pwned me in ways I hadn't been pwned since I saw a photo of Miles Richardson with a midget. We were in stitches every time she spoke during a panel. Her continual egging/friendly griping at Jason for not using her for the BBC7 McGann audios was priceless. I hope Colin is successful in his pursuit to keep Charley as his companion. I'm so glad I got the chance to see her. Lord knows if she'll ever make it back for another convention, I can only hope so.

Speaking of convention returns would it surprise anyone if I said I really hope Lisa Bowerman shows up at Gallifrey 20? It's fun to be able to talk with someone who's worked both sides of the audio studio for Big Finish. The rest of the gang from the Key 2 Time series will be there so in my sad little world it makes sense for her to be there as well. I'm a sad unofficial Benny pimp that way, but that's why you guys love me.

The Magical Bucket of Booze will return at Gallifrey 20 in LA. You won't be able to miss us so do come by and say "hi" if you happen to be there.



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Monday, December 15, 2008

Quick Cross Plug

I've decided it's high time that I chronicle my adventures in fandom and booze. If you think you'd be even remotely interested in reading me voice my opinions on things besides Big Finish audios I encourage you to join me.

Drink + Geek

Must give props to my friends James who helped nail down that blog title for me.


No Livejournal mirror site, but I do have the Facebook Blog Network deal.


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Thursday, December 11, 2008

My Brain Just Exploded With Pleasure

If you were at Chicago TARDIS you might remember that in the Big Finish panels there was talk of a special Paul McGann 8th Doctor release. No info, just promise of a release within the regular Doctor Who line with McGann.

If you read Matthew Cochrane's nifty blog (handy dandy link on your right) you'll remember he mentioned he was getting ready to work on this release. Again, no info outside of something nifty keen is happening with McGann.

If you've gotten your hands on DWM issue #403 you'll see that they've released what's involved with the release. If you haven't and you'd like to remain spoiler free turn back now.

Seriously, avert your eyes because blogger doesn't have the spiffy cut option that Livejournal does. Or if it does I'm not smart enough to discover and use it.

Don't say I didn't warn you.

D
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't

w
a
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t

t
o

h
e
a
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i
t.


The McGann release is currently titled The Company of Friends and will have four stories, each with a different companion. My brain has just exploded with pleasure because one of the stories will be a Lance Parkin tale involving Benny! I cannot be the only one all a flutter over the possibilities of Paul McGann and Lisa Bowerman in an audio together. Can I?

All fluttering aside it's great to see Big Finish give Benny another shot in the main range of Who audios. I had thought we'd seen the last of her in that capacity after the atrocity that was The Dark Flame nearly a hundred releases ago.



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Saturday, December 6, 2008

Chicago TARDIS 2008 - Day Five

Sunday finds me waking up to find there's a huge bruise on my outside right thigh and a pretty ugly gash on the inside of my right ankle. I have no clue how either of those things happened as the Scrabble game never got physical and Saturday night was probably the most sober I'd been the entire convention. Sidenote to Scrabble game: nothing like finishing a game and then having Rob Shearman critique your board to make you feel inadequate. ;)

I continued the usual routine of going downstairs to the lobby to check my email and the weather. Snow was in the forecast as in the early morning the projection was just for 2 -4 inches. By late morning it was starting to snow, but not stick to the ground. Not having seen proper snow in 14 years I had to go outside and catch some on my tongue. At that point though people were saying the forecast was now for close to a foot of snow. This was not cool since I had driven up there and would naturally have to drive back. I had about an hour long freakout as I tried to decide whether to leave right then to beat the weather or take my chances. One drive later to gas up the car and do some other things calmed me down enough to decide to stay.

Based on issues with the schedule Sunday quickly became dubbed "Colin Baker Day". I really wish the schedule hadn't had so many conflicts so I could've seen more than one Q&A session. His sessions were slightly different in that he was on stage by himself and you could walk up to a microphone in the center of the aisle to ask your question. When you got up there he'd ask you your name and then get everyone to say "hi" to you. His sunday session was a lot of fun and helped solidify my newfound love for him thanks to Big Finish. Probably the funniest/saddest question was a woman who went "Are you still acting?" He handled it way better than I. My response would've been, "Go to the dealer's room and find the table with a ton of CD's. There will be plenty with my face circa 1984 on it. Go buy some, listen to them, and then come back with a better question." This is why I'll probably never be allowed to speak at a convention.

But I still go to the zoo with people so it's all good.

After that I quick ran to the dealer's room to get Kate Orman's autograph on some items. I had missed out on her autograph the day before due to the line being so long and her having a panel to be on at 5pm. I had caught her earlier and asked if she'd stick around a bit after Sunday's signing explaining I was going to see Colin. She graciously agreed and then I think I won long time/creepy Kate Orman fan award by producing one of the items I had for her to sign, a Data fanzine from 1994 that had two pages worth of drabbles by her and some really horrible drawings by someone else. The response I got were wide eyes and a very surpries "Fuck off!" said in a good way when I brought out the 'zine.

With that I had an hour to kill before it was time to queue for Colin's autograph. That line wasn't too bad and I watched as the woman in front of me thanked Colin for staying well past quitting time years ago at some convention to sign autographs. Apparently the organizers were going to cap the line but when Colin heard about what was about to happen he told them to bugger off and signed for everyone that wanted one. Colin thanked her and said that it wasn't right to make people queue up and then not let them get what they had queued up for. My turn and I gave him a DVD cover to sign to Tim. To this he said that if I had come yesterday I could've gotten something that he mistakenly addressed to a Tim but that they had found someone named Tim to give to. I thanked him but pointed out that my Tim might've been a tad confused when I came back with some random item with his name and not the DVD cover I was given.

I had Colin sign my Big Finish book and mentioned how I was of the many converted to his Doctor thanks to his work with Big Finish and how they'd done a great job in rehabbing his Doctor. As I walked off I wished him a safe flight and he did the same to me. I couldn't help myself and pointed out that I had actually driven. He and his handler asked where I drove from and rather matter of factly said, "only Houston". Then we talked for a few minutes about that which ended with him wishing me a safe drive. A very nice moment for me.

This pretty much concluded the convention proper portion of the weekend for me. John and I were starving and had no parties to hit so we walked to the mall where I managed to miss the Chicago hot dog stand and get Taco Bell instead. On the way out I spotted a store that sold nothing but bar stuff like pint glasses, beer taps and neon signs. Naturally I had to go inside. I grabbed a Molson Twin Label pint glass with the Molson logo on one side and the label Can I Buy You A Lager on the other. I was eyeing a Phillies glass when I heard a voice similar to Jeri's from Strangers With Candy saying, "That's the thing with boob jobs. They're trying to make everything perfect." The voice went on to say, "Take a look at my breasts." I was afraid she was going to say something about them being fake to which I would've had to interrupt the conversation and tell her to get her money back. To the relief of my imagination which was still working out hilarious scenarios involving That Which Broke My Mind (tm) Friday night she then said "They're not symmetrical." It was on this note that it was decided that it was time to leave the store.

I briefly found myself in the lobby by my lonesome with the Magical Bucket of Booze. Jon Blum is writing an article on Who fandom and was interviewing New Who fans all weekend. I caught the tail end of one of the interviews. I won't spoil it, but the young man being interviewed had a very adult and deep reason for what he gets out of the show which made me feel slightly inadequate.

Those feelings disappeared though with the final night with the Magical Bucket of Booze. At one point I was holding court with Simon, Lisa, Jason Haigh-Ellery, and Laura Doddington. The Magical Bucket helped Laura not break a New Year's resolution and she was impressed that the Magical Bucket of Booze was also recyclable. Lisa and Simon were singing the praises of myself and the entire Time Team to Jason which left me dead chuffed. I preached to the choir (Laura) regarding Lisa's skills as a director and threw out there that she should come back to Gallifrey since the other Key 2 Time folks will be back there. Then I could do another Gallifreyan Edition of the Time Team for the first Key 2 Time story.

The snow had kept falling all day and eventually once the sun had gone down the snow actually started to stick. I tried to get Rob to make snow angels. One Culture Club song later I think I had convincer him I had no evil intentions of just pushing him in the snow. But alas there were no angels to be made at that point. That came later when I convinced Jarrod to make some with me. There are photos somewhere of said angels being made. That was fun but clearly I wasn't drunk enough as I could feel how cold and wet my backside had become.

Simon handed out an anniversary edition of his fanzine "Concrete Elephant" that might have the best synopsis of Romeo and Juliet I've ever seen. The back of the 'zine encourages people to make their own and pass them out at Gallifrey.

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Wednesday, December 3, 2008

Chicago TARDIS 2008 - Day Four

As you may remember, Friday night ended with me piss drunk and paper cutting my good eye with the program schedule. I woke up Saturday with my vision a little blurry, naturally. It wasn't so massive that I ended up asking the hotel to take me to the hospital, but the edges of things were blurry enough that I was a little freaked. For those of you that don't know my bad eye is a pretty useless. I could walk around with a patch on it and have just about the same amount of vision at my disposal. At this point I've been told that technology would allow me to get contacts but that I'd probably still want to wear glasses to protect the good eye.

I made my way downstairs and tried to read the Wall Street Journal, hoping that things would clear up as I became a tad more active. Not at the outset so after an hour or so I went back to bed, resolved to trudge over to Target as soon as it opened. Took a nap, bascially, and then woke up right around opening time for Target. Slipping my Docs and a sweater on I trudged over there, got the eye drops, and made my way back to the room. The vision was clearing up a tad so I was a little less freaked, but the next day and a half I was doing the eye drops every four hours.

Once I got past the eye crisis I eventually made my way to the Writing for Different Media panel with Cornell, Guerrier, Shearman, and Russell. I came in the middle of Guerrier, Russell, and Shearman making fun of Cornell for not using owls in the television version of Human Nature. Much talk about the owls picketing the set since Paul had abandoned them. I'm not sure which image burned deeper into my brain: Paul in the shower with an owl on each shoulder or Rob googling himself to read reviews of his porn work. It was clear though that all four genuinely like one another and I wish someone had videotaped the panel. I couldn't stop laughing.

Next up was the Women of Big Finish panel, with Simon and Jason Haigh-Ellery. Again, tons of fun and just like Friday India Fisher stole the panel. I kind of felt bad to Laura Doddington and Ciara Janson. Since the Key 2 Time series hasn't come out yet it was hard to get them involved in the conversation. But they held their own and this only gave them a taste of what it'll be like for Gallifrey in February. We also got to hear trailers for all three Key 2 Time releases once the sound guys figured out how to play the cd. That actually might've been the funniest part of the panel as everyone on stage was doing a running commentary of the three guys trying to get it to work. At one point I offered to get my laptop and just play it from that.

Eventually I staked my claim in the line for Lis Sladen's autograph. The line was huge and I was part of a group that was waiting in a separate ballroom. An hour and a half later I finally got the stuff I wanted autographed. Lis was lovely, spending a few moments talking to everyone to made their way to her. She got a kick out of my Big Finish coffee table book.

With that knocked out of the way I made my way back to the main ballroom to catch the end of the Big Finish panel. Nothing really new from the panel on Friday, but it was fun to have Nick Briggs join the group. After that panel it was off to the races as I got back in the autograph line for the Big Finish bunch along with Kate Orman and Jon Blum. The line was huge and once again it took over an hour for me to make my way to the table. I said this personally to Nick Briggs later on in the hotel elevator and I'll say it again, it was very nice that they stayed until everyone had gotten through the line. It's obviously the right thing to do, but considering how long each day was for them, the fact that jetlag was still a bit of an issue, and that the women were going to immediately have to go to the other side of the room for an hour long photo session, it would've been understandable if they tried to cut the line off. As it was Kate and some of the other guests had to leave at 5pm because they were scheduled to be on panels. Jon finally connected the Time Team with my face when it was his turn to sign my copy of "Life During Wartime" and noticed the inscriptions. He mentioned having read our session regarding "The Fearmonger", vowing to keep an eye on us, and then not getting back to us. I also surprised him when I busted out my VHS sleeve for "Time Rift". Jon promises that the remastered version should be ready to go in January.

Like Friday night we hit a couple of parties that were happening and snagged some grub. I made my way to the lobby and hung out with some folks. Gary Russell came down and somehow I ended up doing my impersonation of an electronic Frosty the Snowman you might find at your local CVS. Apparently I amused him enough to have him ask me to do it again. It obviously loses something in translation so I'll be more than happy to do it at Gallifrey if requested.

The Magical Bucket of Booze (tm) made its way down to the lobby where I found myself talking smack as I played scrabble with Jarrod. A natural outlet for my heckling tendencies. Rob Shearman found his way to our group and we talked for a few hours. The water wall was doing its job as I started nodding off, only to be woken up to everyone in the group telling me to go to bed.

So that's just what I did.



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Saturday, November 29, 2008

Chicago TARDIS 2008 - Day Three

Alcohol to replenish the Magical Bucket of Booze...$37.86

Lis Sladen Autograph...$20.00

Clear Eyes Triple Action Eye Drops...$2.16

Having to buy the Clear Eyes because your mind was broken last night by some information that wouldn't have broken you so much if you weren't piss drunk and when later in the evening you were imagining a scenario involving said mind breaking information, with your glasses off and managing to nick your eye with the corner of the fucking program schedule....Priceless

You probably want me to fill in the blanks, don't you?

Day three would start with us standing in line to get our packets. Apparently I wasn't cool enough to rate a pre-printed name badge. I don't feel so bad though because Dan had gotten his stuff in July and hadn't gotten a pre-printed name badge either. Then it was on to the races trying to figure out how to work through the damn scheduling conflicts.

It turned out to be a Big Finish/Writers day as I traveled back and forth between rooms to either see a Big Finish related panel, get autographs from the Big Finish gang, or listen to some of the writers talk about their craft. Autographs came first and it was nice to once again thrill and provide chuckles for the guests as they saw their younger selves in the Big Finish Audio book. As always, the Benny gang of Lisa Bowerman, Paul Cornell, Simon Guerrier, and Rob Shearman were pleasure to chat as the autograph line moved. It was my first time meeting India Fisher and Jason Haigh-Ellery and both are kind and gracious. And as a bonus I got Lisa to do a personal inscription on an item for Tim.

During the Benny panel Paul talked about the fact that he's in discussion to come back and do some work on Benny in a couple of years along with mention of the tenth season. Before you ask, nothing was specifically mentioned about the tenth season, just that we can expect one.

India Fisher had me in stitches during the Big Finish panel. She is just a laugh riot and tons of fun. Most of that session involved talking about the upcoming Key 2 Time series.

The various writers panel were great for those aspiring writers/authors. Rob Shearman's session was basically him holding court discussing how ugly the World Fantasy Award is and the early days of the new series when they were trying to push the boundaries of what the BBC would let them do. Simon went into a bit of how he got to where he was as an author, his influences, and the basic process of getting commissioned and doing a BBC new series book. Later in another panel he would talk about working with the 25 new writers for the Short Trips anthology. Kate Orman and Jon Blum talked a tad about writing during the New Adventures era, a story that never saw the light of day, and how they work together as a writing team.

Later on I made another run to the liquor store since the Magical Bucket of Booze was running low. For those of you in Texas think of it as a smaller Spec's. I picked up a 12 pack of Sam Adams lager and Shiner Cheer. Yes, I managed to find Shiner in Chicago. The Christmas Cheer is their dunkel with a noticeable peach aftertaste and a hint of pecans. I'm digging it but I think it might've been a tad too wonky for Simon.

There were some parties that were hit because I'm all about the Tacos of Doom and you can't avoid going to an awesome celebration for the Third Doctor. He's not my favorite, but I respect the passion of his fans for throwing that party. Anyone interested in a Benny one at Gallifrey?

Eventually my way was made back down to the lobby with the Magical Bucket of Booze by my side. Simon stopped by to partake of The Bucket for a second night. Again, this is what I love about these conventions. You can sit down in the hotel lobby, have a few beers, and chat with guests like you're old mates. There's no pretentions or vibe that they're better than you. At the heart of the matter they're also fans, just fans who got lucky to work on show they love.

It was during this point of the evening that my mind was broken. I made it up to the room with the remains of The Bucket. I plopped into bed, took my glasses off, and was speaking of that which broke my mind while flipping the convention schedule which was printed separate from the convention program. My eye normally freaks out when anything comes within a twenty mile radius of it, but apparently the booze weakened the defenses because before I knew it the damn corner of a page I was flipping knicked my eye.



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Friday, November 28, 2008

Chicago TARDIS 2008 - Day Two

Day two found me texting my roommate at 6:30am wondering what room he was in so I could finally crash. I was starting to drift asleep in the lobby and I didn't want to be that person, especially since I kind of looked like a bum. But before that I had some lovely eggs benedict and hash browns in one of the hotel restaurants. I kind of wandered in sad and pathetic asking if they were open. I was in luck as they had just opened. If someone can find me a more picture perfect eggs benedict than what I had here I'll be impressed.

I made it the room and ended up catching a couple hours of sleep. More would've been nice but at the same time I was afraid I'd screw up my sleep pattern. Very quickly I decide I'll just go the Gallifrey route of being up for an insanely long period of time. The showers at the hotel rock! Double shower head and a nice fluffy robe. Free in room Starbucks let me be the coffee whore/hypocrite that I am. Eventually I wandered back downstairs where people were finally showing up. Immediately I was invited to a party friday night celebrating the Third Doctor. There will be free booze.

Speaking of booze the hotel bars closed at 8pm since it was the holidays. This meant that there would be a bunch of Englishmen very sad and very sober at this state of affairs. Damn us and our celebrating the shipment of Puritans getting ready to steal land from the Indians. And I like beer as well if you hadn't noticed. After a lovely conversation with Paul Cornell that Dan and I had it was decided that the impending booze crisis had to averted. Someone else was also pointing out to the hotel staff that the lack of booze was sad while I was getting a hotel shuttle to drive me to a liquor store. We found probably the only one open in our neck of the woods and provisions were procured.

Sidenote: The Westin is VERY nice. Not that I've stayed at tons of hotels, but this might be the first where by the end of the day I knew half the staff's names. Everyone went out of their way to wish us a Happy Thanksgiving, tell us their names, and let us know they were gonna spoils us rotten if we let them. It's amazing what a little bit of a personal touch and communication can do. Wish more companies realized that.

When our other roommate, John, got in we hung out in the lobby some more before going to get the traditional holiday meal of White Castle. Actually Dan has never had White Castle so we figured Thanksgiving was a good as time as any to remedy that situation. We piled back into the hotel shuttle to go to White Castle. We were not the only people with belly bombers on our minds as the place was packed. We quickly learned the reason for this as the place was only staff with four people: The manager, some kid named Dan, some senior citizen who was sporting a name badge with the words "Trainee", and a guy hidden in the back who didn't go anywhere near the grease. The manager was assembling burgers like there was no tomorrow all the while screaming at White Castle Dan to get the fries down in a high pitched voice that our Dan did to perfection. White Castle Dan was getting screamed at about the fries but he was too busy helping Grandma on the register who couldn't grok that you'd press the onion ring button when someone ordered onion rings. Literally every order involved her calling Shouty Manager or White Castle Dan to help with the register. Someone needs to explain to me why you would even put a trainee on a register for a holiday? We were howling as we were waiting for our food and Dan was doing a very loud impression of Shouty Manager. 50 years later we got our food. John apparently did something wrong as he didn't get an apology for waiting while Dan and I did.

Back in the lobby and we settled down to our Thanksgiving meal. The magical bucket of booze made its first appearance along with a rather jaunty Pilgrim hat I was sporting. Or leprachaun hat/Patrick Troughton hat as later declared by Paul Cornell and Simon Guerrier accordingly. I apparently missed the hat going on Simon's head as I had gone to refill the magicical bucket of booze. I hear there might be photos. The rest of the evening was spent chatting with Paul, Simon and Tara who I later learned shared an intense love of 80's American cartoons and might have a friend in common with me.

The magical bucket of booze is still full. Think of it as the TARDIS of booze.



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Thursday, November 27, 2008

Chicago Tardis 2008 - Day One

What would be an excursion to a Who convention if I didn't give you all a little travelogue of my adventures?

After much hemming and hawing I decided to drive up to Chicago from Houston. Gas prices have dropped significantly and it gave me some flexibility since The Westin is kind of in the suburbs of Chicago. I hit the road Wednesday morning around 6:30am after finding kind souls to watch the cats and last minute stuff to the car. Now, the directions I printed said it should take me a little over 18 hours to do the drive. I've no clue how fast they think I planned on going, but I call shenanigans. I went a tad insane and just drove straight through. I stopped only for gas and the occasional bathroom/foot warming break and arrived at the hotel at 4:30am Thursday. The longest break was probably 30 minutes or so.

Speaking of calling shenanigans I also do so in regards to the weather. I grew up in South Jersey so I know cold, but haven't had much practice in the 14 years I've been down in Houston. The weather reports all say the lows in Chicago would be in the upper 20's. My car thermometer says it's 19 degrees and I had the frozen legs to prove it. I choose to travel without the heat running. I had no clue how bad my legs were initially until I stepped out of the car and immediately had trouble walking. Clearly I need to rebuild my cold weather tolerance.

Overall the drive was nice. I'm kind of glad I plowed right through because I hit a couple of spots where the traffic was funky due to construction. Those got hit during off hours in terms of traffic so it allowed me to have my freak out moment in regards to where I needed to be without screwing up other people or causing accidents. Speaking of which, I saw a bunch, all going westbound so it just gave me something to look at besides trees. Which I saw a lot of and while I like fall foliage it kind of turns into white noise after the fourth hour.

One of the places I stopped for gas was at some deal called Boomland!. Honestly, that's what it's called. The place to get all your fireworks, kitschy evil rooster knick knacks, and Jesus paraphanelia. Think of it as a tacky Buc-ee's.

As I noted, I got into the hotel around 4:30am. I'm currently chillin' in the lobby all by my lonesome. I must admit to being a tad surprised. While I didn't think a lot of people would be coming in Wednesday I just figured that surely some had and they'd make their way to the lobby. The guys I'm staying with got in on Wednesday but the original plan was for me to arrive in the afternoon. I figure it's a bit of a party foul to send a text in the early AM wondering what room I should go to just because I got all crazy and drove straight through.



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Sunday, November 9, 2008

Chicago, Chicago..

Yes, I shall be in the windy city for this year's Chicago TARDIS. Tickets are still available and there's a preliminary schedule full of nougatty goodness. We'll try to have a Time Team up before then, but no promises with the holidays fast approaching. As with Gallifrey if you read this blog and you're gonna be at TARDIS as well I'd love to meet you. Also since I've got a laptop with mighty fine speakers I'll be posting a recap of my adventures in booze and Who ala' Gallifrey.

Speaking of Gallifrey, tickets and hotel rooms are going like hot cakes. The guest list is absolutely awesome for this early in the game and there's the promise of more to come. Seriously, if you're even thinking of going to Gallifrey I'd book my hotel room now if I were you to get the con rate while you can.

I'm sure I'm late to the party, but in case you've been living under a rock Rob Shearman recently won a World Fantasy Award for his collection Tiny Deaths.

The final two plays in the 9th season of Bernice Summerfield, The Adventure of the Diogenes Damsel and The Diet of Worms, has been released. The cover design is now up for this year's novella collection, Professor Bernice Summerfield and the Vampire Curse.

Like I said hopefully we'll get another Time Team installment in before Chicago. If not hopefully I'll see you in Chicago.

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Listening to: The Bluetones - Vampire
via FoxyTunes

Sunday, October 12, 2008

Post Ike Edition

As I said in the previous post we all survived Hurricane Ike relatively intact. Many thanks to those of you that sent private and public well wishes. Houston is slowly getting back to normal but it will take a long time for Galveston to rebuild, if they even try to rebuild the whole island. One of the things our Who group in Houston likes to do every year is Dickens on the Strand. It's an annual Dickensian festival that happens the first weekend in December. You get to buy Ye Olde' Gorditas and give pennies to street urchins sporting their finest Nike sneakers. Family of elves smoke as local newscasters speak jive to Santa before the parade begins. Some male relative of Dickens shows up and gives a reading of The Christmas Carol. You can also tour some of the historical houses for an extra fee, every year I try to go to the one serving the English Breakfast and never make it.

This year we don't know right now if there will be a Dickens on the Strand. From what I'm hearing a lot of those old homes were damaged, which is not suprising considering how bad the storm was and how only residents are still allowed on the island. While giving to the Red Cross or donating blood is a great way to help, the Space City Timelords will try to help out the Galveston Historical Foundation, who puts on Dickens on the Strand. Where else am I gonna be able to get into a historical festival at a discounted costume rate when I tell them I'm a time traveler who's visiting and that's why I'm wearing jeans and a sweater. All kidding aside, Dickens on the Strand has provided us many years of enjoyment and we hope that at least that part of Galveston is able to continue.

I am seriously bummed about Ian Collier.

Food today is provided by Dickey's Barbecue Pit. Much slow cooked meat and sides are consummed. Nothing fancy in the beer department this time. Just some Shiner Bock that's been hanging out in the fridge.

The Bellotron Incident ushers in the beginning of season four for Benny and the return of Louise Falkner as Bev Tarrant. We're implored to gather round the campfire and listen to Old Man tell an old tale about war.

Me: All the Who's down in Whoville?

Old Man keeps droning on about his story, imploring children and talismans to be kept safe.

Tim: Is this a four minute monologue?


Angelie: It's only four minutes out of sixty minutes.

Tim: You only get thirty seconds in an audition.


The first track ends and we get the second track which seems to be a continuation of the monologue.

Tim: Oh my god! I'm not drunk enough for this.

Angelie: This track is only two minutes long.

Tim: On top of the first four! This is like every Chris Carter season premiere.

The Old Man gets killed and there's much rejoicing.

Tim: Alas poor Yurick, I knew him well, Horatio.

We get some dialogue and someone mentions Potatoheads.

Angelie: Mmm....potatoes....


Tim: And his bucket of parts?


We're still Bennyless almost ten minutes in as we learn the officers talking are in the middle of the Rutan/Sontaran war. They come across a dead nomad and his equally dead pack animal, wondering how they died.

Tim: By monologue.


The probe investigating the planet goes all pissy and sends a message saying a specialist needs to be involved.

Angelie: Like Benny?

She's reading the Captain's mind as he calls Braxiatel, apparently an old friend. The Captais says the planet they're in orbit around is called Bellotron.

Me: I think we have title! And exposition.

The planet is moving in a funky orbit and need someone to investigate the planet in the next thirty-six hours. Preferably someone that's knowledgable, tactful, and willing to follow orders.

Angelie and Me: That's not Benny.

Fifteen minutes in and we finally get Benny as she's come out of cryo sleep, fairly cranky. She's giving The Commander a hard time going through all the security protocols. Benny remarks that she's being escorted by two penis substitution ships.

Angelie: They call them dildoes.

As we go through more exposition Tim busts of the new Doctor Who monster book to show Angelie what the Rutans look like.

Me: This is pretty disappointing so far for a Mike Tucker script.

Tim: I'm glad he had that scene with Braxiatel because I really stopped paying attention prior to that. They completely recap what happened in the previous two scenes. We really didn't need it.

The first "Goddess" is uttered.

Angelie and Me: drink!


Me: And this bit of exposition is totally negating the exposition recap between Brax and The Captain.

Then we go through a bunch of stuff that maybe The Captain should have before Benny showed up: like naming her a mission specialist in the computer and ascertaining if The Commander thinks she's competent enough.

Me: Yeah, he's a good person to ask, seeing as he's only known her for like twenty minutes. Are they trying to go for sexual tension between Benny and The Commander...


Angelie: Because it's not working.


Me: Yeah.

Benny bitches out The Commander for not bringing back up with them as they go onto the planet.

Me: They really could've started the story from this point and dropped the first twenty or so minutes.


Tim: Yeah.


Benny says "cruk".

Me: Drink.

The Commander disengages the engine as he and Benny land on the planet.

Me: Just like we're disengaged from the story. Ooo....Benny said "Goddess. Drink!

They land and there's a weird howling sound in the background.

Me: Did they land on the Wookie planet?

Tim: Or the Star Trek comedy planet?

Benny talks about her wily feminine intution regarding not trying to be Brill food and Angelie and I just kind of look at each other.

Angelie: I'm about to go get some dental floss.


Me: Seriously, Mike Tucker has done some really good stories. This is not one of them. He's resorted to making Benny queen of the one-liners like some sort of bad Don Rickles. Not that there's really a good Don Rickles but...

Stuff happens and they move deeper into the tunnels. They get to one tunnel and Benny thinks she sees something.

Me: Like a better script?

Tim: That's not the cup of the carpenter.

We've got Rutan!

Tim: I think the Rutan here just talked more than in the entire of the original Who series.


Bev makes a dramatic entrance.

Tim: Should I remember that name?


Me: The Genocide Machine.

All three make it back to the ship and Bev gets locked up in The Commander's room.

Me: Oh yeah!

Benny makes to sneak back onto the planet and runs into Bev who's escaped.

Me: Bev is like the best part of this audio.

The Commander learns that Bev has left his room and is now in a holding cell on the ship. He complains to The Captain about having locked her in his room herself.

Tim: (as The Commander) I lashed her to the bed and took pictures. See, I posted them on the internet.

Eventually we learn the Bev with Benny is a Rutan agent and there actually is a Bev in the holding cell, the real one.

Me: This is actually bit like The Genocide Machine with the fake versions of characters.


The Sontarans leave their side of the border and go for the planet.

Me: Sontara-ha! Sontara-ha!


We think Benny's been killed but then she shows up on the ship professing not to know The Commander or anything that's just happened.

Me: What the fuck?

It turns into some Sex and the City thing as Bev and Benny bond over booze and memories of the Doctor.

Tim: For those of you confused, the real Benny just happened on the scene. It's a shame they only can refer to him as The Doc.

Me: At least they can do that much.

Angelie: We're listening to a Doctor Who one next, right?

Me: Yeah.

Angelie: Let's hope this one is better than what we just listened to.


The next one in question is Winter For The Adept featuring the Fifth Doctor and Nyssa in a script written by Andrew Cartmel.

Me: Great, another fucking monologue.


Angelie: The weekend of monologues.


Tim and I spend a few minutes reminding Angelie who Andrew Cartmel is, what he looks like, and that we all saw him at Gallifrey this year.

Angelie: I have to pee now.


Me: Might as well go. You're only missing another fucking monologue.

Angelie: But at least this monologue is actually giving some useful information.


Alison yells out to Peril to be careful about the rope. This is when Angelie walks back in and mocks hanging from the ceiling. We learn that Peril is apparently the female version of Scrooge getting left at school during the winter holidays and about to elope. We then shift to Nyssa complaining about the snow, wondering if there's anything worse than snow in the shoes.

Me: A toss up between the last Benny play or Dragon's Wrath.

Peter Jurasik shows up as a local cop on skis to help Nyssa on her way. We go back to Peril and Alison talking about Peril getting married.

Angelie: Where's the Doctor?


Tim: We're like eight minutes in and no Doctor. But we've got a companion and a person who will be a companion.

Me: And Peter Jurasik.


Angelie: As much as Tim and Nicole are trying to convince me of what we do have I'm still missing the Doctor.

Nyssa sees someone coming towards her and the sking Jurasik.

Me: Is it The Doctor?

The person shows up and sadly it's not the Doctor. Some French chick shows up and Tim and I start doing horrible cheese eating surrender monkey accents.

Angelie: I already went wee wee.


Tim: Half of episode one is over and still no Doctor.

The Crazy Scotch woman who opens windows in freezing weather freaks out when all the windows close.

Tim: Oh. Really.

Angelie: They should call Ghost Hunters to debunk it.

Nyssa and the Cheese Eating Surrender Monkey maid bust open the cognac.

Tim: That's a good idea.

They smell something that reminds the Cheese Eating Surrender Monkey Maid of dead horses.

Angelie: (french accent) Oo...my bad...


The Cheese Eating Surrender Monkey Maid mentions a poltergeist.

Me: (
ala' Heather O'Rourke) They're heeereeeee....

Tim corrects the Cheese Eating Surrender Monkey Maid on her definition of a poltergeist.

Angelie: Where's the Doctor?


Tim: At least it didn't start with the TARDIS having an accident like seventy-five percent of Davison's stories. Maybe he wasn't available.

News of India Fisher (Peril) planning to elope with Peter Jurasik (Lieutenant Sandoz) brings the crazy Scotch headmistress out of her weird psychosis.

Tim: It's like a William Hartnell story where the Doctor takes a nap for an episode. (as the Doctor) Oh Chesterton, I'm going to lie down on this rock and sleep while the Daleks chase you and Susan around.

More crazy things happen and they all run away from a wardrobe.

Me: Is Aslan trying to get out?

Tim: He could be stuck.

The TARDIS finally shows up.

Tim and Nyssa: Finally!

Alison remarks about touching the TARDIS.

Me: (ala' Katy Perry) I touched the TARDIS and I liked it/Hope my friends don't mind it.

Tim: (ala' Katy Perry) It looked so small but it was really large inside.

Nyssa begins to channel Tegan as she bitches out the Doctor about the TARDIS never going where they plan it to. The Doctor is willing to admit there might be a correlation between the TARDIS arriving and the poltergeist activity.

Tim: Just like there's a correlation between you showing up some place and everyone dying.

Nyssa continues to channel Tegan as she's all pissed about The Doctor wanting to stay and investigate the poltergeist activity.

Peril and Sandoz make out while trying to get the radio to work.

Tim: Hold me closer, tiny dancer.

The Doctor goes back to Nyssa and Alison. Alison wonders if The Doctor has figured everything out yet.

Me: Bitch, he's only been gone for like five minutes! He's not that good. Seriously, I don't remember Nyssa being this bitchy.


Tim: She wasn't. She was a refreshing change from the other companions.

The Doctor and Nyssa go to check out the chapel.

Me: (ala' The Church Lady) The chapel? How convenient! Mm....Satan?


We enter the ever pivotal ham eating sandwhich portion of the audio. Sounds start coming from the music room and they quickly discount it being the Cheese Eating Surrender Monkey Maid.

Me: Who can't it be now? Who can it be now?

Angelie: Oooo...oh. Who can it? Who can it?

Me: Oooooo...oh, who can it be now?


The piano attacks the Doctor and Nyssa. Then faucets start running in the kitchen. Nyssa worries something worse might happen.

Me: Like Dragon's Wrath?


Nyssa almost gets killed by Sandoz's ski poles and the Doctor fixates on tea as the piano continues to lumber towards them. He spikes the tea, causing Alison to fall asleep and the piano stops its slow murderous path. The Doctor wonders where he puts his bag.

Angelie: (as The Doctor) I'm trying to find my condoms.

The helicopter that's supposed to rescue them gets destroyed, leaving them stranded because no one wants to get into the TARDIS.

The Doctor confirms that the evil is emanating from the chapel. Nyssa continues to whinge and moan ala' Tegan.

Tim: She really is channeling Tegan.


The Doctor busts out the machine that caused the accident that caused Nyssa to end up in the school.

Me: Maybe it'll teleport your personality back.


Peril sings a nursery rhyme about wishing the rain would go away and come back on the washing day.

Me: And bring a better script with you.


Angelie: Because this one smells like poo.


Peril tells her family history.

Me: We have title!

The Doctor points out that Alison is controlling Peril's abilities.

Me: Alison/This world is killing you/Oooo...Alison....my aim is true.

Crazy Scotch woman overhears The Doctor talking about Peril's family's past and decides that Peril's a witch that must be killed. Through crazy circuitous logic Crazy Scotch woman links electric blankets to Satan. Sandoz kills Crazy Scotch woman and Peril gets off a great line about how Crazy Scotch woman won't be able to be killed if she's not dead now.

Things start to go to hell in a handbasket again as trophies fly at The Doctor and the piano starts playing again. The Doctor triggers a post hypnotic suggestion that puts both Alison and Peril to sleep. Sandoz demands to know what's going on.

Me: Dude, have you not been following what's been going on?


Angelie: This reminds me of an
X-Files episode.

Tim: "Syzgy".

Episode three ends with a rather crappy cliffhanger of The Doctor suggesting they hold a seance. Sandoz and the Cheese Eating Surrender Monkey Maid refuse to take part in the seance. Harding Wellman, some English climber lost in an avalanche shows up.

Tim: Do you know why they call me Harding?

Me: Great, he's an effette British ghost.

The seance goes pear shaped rather quickly and everyone runs to the kitchen, including Wellman.

Me: I think I need a chart to follow how Wellman, Alison, and Peril are all connected.

The gestalt leaves Crazy Scotch woman and The Doctor talks to the Cheese Eating Surrender Monkey Maid. He calls out The Cheese Eating Surrender Monkey Maid who's really a scout for the spillagers. The Spilager Formerly Known as The Cheese Eating Surrender Monkey Maid ends up dead and the Doctor convinces Sandoz to help him dispose of her body because they decomp really fast.

Me: Oh, like work.

Sandoz reveals himself as a second spilager scout. Peril starts freaking out.

Me: And you were gonna have sex with that.


Peril gets shot and then the Spilager Formerly Known as Sandoz ends up getting killed in an avalanche. The Doctor ends up saving her life with some bullet eating/tissue repairing poultice. This means bitchy Nyssa has to take part in the seance. We don't see the seance but we assume jiggery pokery occurs as the Spillager Fleet gets killed. Then we get the TARDIS once again not working and Peril taking Harding home to see her parents.

Me: I didn't hate this as much as I've hated the novels that Cartmel wrote for The New Adventures range, but this was still a tad disappointing.

Tim: It would've been much better if Nyssa hadn't sounded like Tegan. It's like he wanted to write for Janet Fielding but couldn't so he just put her in the form of Nyssa.

We return to Benny and The Draconian Rage.

Tim: Draconians are all the rage now. And another villian we only saw once in the original series.

Benny wonders why the Draconians want her.

Tim: You are the lead of this series.


Benny thinks she shouldn't go and calls Brax callous for trying to talk her into it.

Tim: (as Brax) Me? Callous? Never?


Eventually Brax sweet talks her into going to Draconia. As Benny lands and gets a long winded greeting Tim shows Angelie what they look like.

Angelie: And they have rage?

Tim: They're more like the classic series version of the Klingons. They're all into honor and what not.

Angelie: But the disk says they have rage.


Tim: Yeah, I guess they'll have rage later.


Benny gets a level 5 sterilization.

Me: Put your hand in the box!

Benny objects to having her luggage searched.

Tim: (as Draconian) We've seen the
Indiana Jones movies.

Tim and Angelie bust out the box for the Malm as Benny goes planetside as the Draconian Emperor gets flattered by some underpants gnome. Draconian Emperor asks Underpants Gnome if he's heard of Shakespeare.

Me: (as Draconian) It loses translation when you take it out of its native Klingon.


Exposition continues between Draconian Emperor and Underpants Gnome. We switch to exposition between Benny and her Draconian Guide about the history of the city and the place of Draconian woman within their society.

Me: Why does he sound like a German?


After some more exposition Benny gets handed off to the Underpants Gnome when she reaches the imperial palace. She begins to cheese off the Underpants Gnome with her usual glib and sarcastic responses.

Me: Again she's being almost too sarcastic for the situation. She knows how the Draconians normally view women and she's pissing the Underpants Gnome off for no discernible reason.

The Emperor interrupts Benny's Former Guide as he's taking a bath. Apparently he's fallen in love with Rubber Ducky which is just kind of wrong.

Benny gets freaked out when she sees a human skull and then gets kidnapped by the Underpants Gnome's guards. She tries to talk her way out of Underpants Gnome's desire to drill into her head. Underpants Gnome mentions he's an agent of the Dark Flame.

Me: We'll be getting to that in the main line in about four years at the rate we're going.

Apparently her guide is also a member of the Dark Flame as he helps shave Benny's head. They begin to drill into her noggin.

Me: That's gonna leave a mark.


She passes out and then reawakens to have them drilling into her noggin again.

Benny's Former Guide goes to see the Emperor.

Me: (as Draconian) I found the nougatty center, Sire.

We get a discussion on how cognac tastes like urine to the Emperor. The Emperor apparently doesn't trust anyone around him. He says he smells treachery on the Underpants Gnome.

Me: That's just Benny's blood.

Angelie: Yep.


Me: For someone that's just had a hole drilled through her head she's rather talkative.

Insert more exposition as Underpants Gnome is apparently not as evil as we thought. He explains the extent of the political intrigue going on the planet and tells Benny she's the only hope to keep the planet from being taken over by the Dark Flame cult.

Me: One thing, she's got a hole in head.


Underpants Gnome tells Benny how she can escape.

Me: She might not remember all those details. That whole hole in the head thing.

Angelie: So Benny's getting rescued by...


Me: See, I can't keep up with who's who. They sound too much alike and their names are way too similar. Hence why I'm calling them Underpants Gnome and Benny's Guide.

Angelie: I think it's the guide trying to save her. That's why she was telling him she was invited by the Emperor.

Me: No, she was telling that to the Underpants Gnome. See what I mean?

Benny ends up with the Emperor and they quarrel over pedantry, the skull, and what she's doing there.

Me: Do you not see the hole in her head?

We enter The Manchurian Candidate as Benny kills the Emperor.

Angelie: They didn't take something out, they put something in.


The Underpants Gnome and Benny's Former Guide pop out of nowhere all excited that Benny's killed the Emperor, confirming what they did to her. Drama goes up to about factor 9 as Benny freaks out about the Dark Flame being in her skull all this time and how it might have affected Peter.

Me: Oh, that's the least of things you should be worried about having messed up Peter.


Benny's Former Guide ends up killing the Underpants Gnome.

Angelie: This is so melodramatic.


The Emperor really isn't dead and they expound on their plan to out the Underpants Gnome.

Tim: War between Draconians and Humans is averted. Ya.

The Emperor ends up killing Benny's Former Guide.

Me: All of a sudden we're in
Titus.

Tim: They're going out of their way to painfully make this like a Shakespeare play.

Benny opts not to kill the Emperor again and they both depart hating each other's guts.

Me: That was cruddy.

Angelie: The ending?


Me: The whole thing. I had problems keeping up with the Draconian advisors. The voice actors were too similar and the character names too similar.

Tim: I didn't have that problem. I really wasn't paying attention until they stated torturing Benny. And I was okay with all the Shakespeare stuff going on.

Angelie: (in refernce to Benny being tortured) I didn't like that.


Tim: I guess this has to be an audio because the ending doesn't play well in any other format. I was okay with it.

If you're keeping up with the Benny Drinking Game, "Goddess" was uttered eleven times and "Cruk" once by our count.

Next month will be an all Benny affair as we'll finish off the fourth season.


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Monday, September 15, 2008

Hurricane Ike

We made it. We're not in Galveston, but if you've been watching the news you know that there was really no where to hide from the storm.

None of us have power. I'm currently hanging out in a trailer my employer has placed in the back of one of our locations.

Obviously I don't know when we'll be up and running again. Lord willing we'll have a sequence for September, but as you can guess us and the rest of Southeast Texas will be focusing on getting things back up and running.



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Sunday, August 31, 2008

Labor Day Edition

After gorging ourselves on diet coke and homemade pizza we drop Dance of the Dead in the cd player. It doesn't take long to hear "goddess" uttered and then us to take a sip of Newcastle. I remember that this seems to take place after the Plague Herds of Excelis but since we'd have to listen to the whole series we settle for just being slightly befuddled when Benny complains about Iris.

Matthew Brenher comes onto to the scene as Grand Marshall Sstac and Tim quickly picks up that Brenher was in Red Dawn.

Things start blowing up, Benny keeps uttering "goddess", and we start getting drunk. Benny and Sstac end up accidently inhaling some crystal memories from the Colgarians.

Me: I do that sometimes as well.


Tim and Angelie start doing Ice Warrior impersonations as Azzar and Karter try to fix things on the ship.

Tim: It was much worse in the 60's and 70's. They drew every "s" out then.


Benny talks about digging up Martian tombs but forgets to mention going back to Mars for a conference and reading of xeno-porn. Then they start calling each other different names and things start getting really weird. Apparently the stuff they snorted is manifesting themselves through visions generated by the memories of the Colgarians.

We think Benny said shit and then we do various impersonations of Ice Warriors saying shit. Apparently though Benny is the Fonz as she beats a lift into submission to take them to level 10. But her mojo isn't as good since as soon as they get inside the lift starts acting up again.

Sstac goes back to his Colgarian persona and tries to get Benny to hook up with him. Then Benny gets into the act as well. It seems the Colgarian couple had some issues and were rather dysfunctional. A bitch slap later knocks sense into Benny. Eventually they get out of the lift and have a little heart to heart as they're climbing up the shaft.

Azzar is calling on the hounds of hell to kick some ass for the ship being attacked. Benny and Sstac get on to the bridge and this is where things go all Edward Albee again. Azzar ends up slamming her fist in a console, killing herself.

A crap ass plot twist shows up as we learn Karter is really alive and a thief. He's cleared a way to the shuttles which of course gives Benny and Sstac a way off the ship as it's careening towards a satellite. Benny reminds Karter that he's got some precious jewels between his legs. The shots to the family jewels doesn't completely work though as Sstac ends up going over again to his Colgarian persona and gets shot by Karter. Insert tender moments as Colgarian Benny says goodbye to Colgarian Sstac.

Me: That's kind of a lackluster ending.


Tim just shrugs. I don't know how to feel about the ending. I like how she tried to emotionally connect with the Ice Warrior. Maybe it was just the beer but that was the easiest part to follow, their other relationship.

Next up is The Spectre of Lanyon Moor with Colin Baker as the Sixth Doctor and Maggie Stables as Evelyn Smythe. We meet up with Scryfan and Sancreda.

Tim: Sancreda sounds like Sylvester McCoy with a cold.


Sancreda apparently is left behind by Scryfan.

Tim: E.T.! Phone home!

There's a great debate whether going one way for breakfast or the other to check out some ancient tunnels.

Me: He's passing up breakfast?

The Brigadier shows up on the scene.

Me: Ya!!!

The Brig laments the lack of coffee:

Tim: There's no coffee coming if you're expecting the womenfolk to make it. I'm still holding out hope that he'll appear in the show with Tennant.

The Doctor and Evelyn meet up with the upstart archaeologist not named Benny and get an offer of breakfast.

Tim: I'm impressed she's more excited about breakfast than he is.

Professor Morgan is a grumpy old man who's not down with technology in the field of archaeology. The Doctor and Evelyn show up and meet up with The Brig.

Tim: Is the Brigadier fishing for tail?


Me: I think Evelyn is fishing for booty.

Tim: It's ashame this wasn't on tv. This might be the best of these "first meetings" between the Doctor and the Brigadier.


Evelyn begs for breakfast as the Doctor wants her to help with research.

Me: Damn, she's all about breakfast.

Ludgate asks if he can get the Doctor and the Brigadier anything before he leaves.

Tim:(as the Doctor) Breakfast? The Doctor isn't used to anyone being so good at research since Sarah Jane. I'm liking Colin Baker as the Doctor much better in the audios than on the TV. Maybe it's because I'm not distracted by his coat. And probably because he's got a companion he's not bickering with. Not that Peri was dumb, but with Evelyn he's got someone that's just as interested in history as he is.

Evelyn makes a new friend who ends up getting eaten by what sounds like a bunch of gremlins. She's recovering back at the institute and Ludgate offers to get her some tea. She asks for hot chocolate.

Me: (as Evelyn) And some biscuits?

The Doctor bitches out Professor Morgan and then Evelyn makes him apologize. He proceeds to suck up to Morgan asking for his expertise as an archaeologist.

Me: Because he doesn't have Benny handy.

Tim: He hasn't met Riversong yet.


Evelyn makes the world's worst cat burglar as she gets busted by Sir Flint after sneaking back into his home. Then we get the baddie giving exposition section of the audio as he explains why he's doing what he's doing. Evelyn's not the greatest prisoner as all the she can toss back is that Flint is nuts. Eventually Evelyn escapes and meets up with Ludgate. She goes through a series of things that Flint has done to her.

Me: She can't do the list of horrible things to have happened to her like Lisa can as Benny.

Meanwhile the Doctor and the Brigadier are trying to stop Morgan's housekeeper who's being controlled by the gremlins.

Evelyn and Ludgate go back to Flint's house and my lightbulb goes on just before Evelyn's does regarding Ludgate working for Flint.

Morgan's housekeeper, Moynihan, releases Sancreda. He talks about getting revenge after 18,000 years.

Me: That's some serious amount of hate and discontent built up.

The hate and discontent proves to be wasted as we learn that Sancreda actually killed Scryfan 18,000 years ago. The Brigadier proves once again how much of a man he is by taking Sancreda on mano e mano. Honestly, the Brigadier is the man's man.

From Classic Who's Man Man we move to Benny and her own Man's Man, Jason Kane who are joined by Brax and Adrian in the season three finale The Mirror Effect.

Me: Let the mind cruk begin!

We're dropped into the middle of the action as Jason and Benny emerge through a mirror. We also learn that Benny might have a taste for SM as she notes with a bit of glee the architecture. Brax and Adrian arrive at some other place, also taking Jason's name in vain. It doesn't take them long to find the first body.

Benny and Jason have a fight over whether or not Jason should touch things and whether or not he's her sidekick. Benny then fires up a console.

Me: So it's okay for Benny just to randomly touch shit but not Jason?

Tim: She's a professional random...button...toucher.

Brax and Adrian recover some logs that show that something nasty happened at the site. Meanwhile Dr. Carnivel attacks Jason and Benny only stopping when Carnivel draws blood. Then insert some classic Benny/Jason comedy as she backhand thanks him for saving her and then jabs at him while asserting her position of authority in pricking Jason to Carnivel. Add in a dash of exposition as Carnivel explains that Benny and Jason were actually leading an expedition that Carnivel was a part of but that Benny and Jason don't remember.

Mirror Benny shows up starts accussing Brax of engineering her getting knocked up by Adrian to use Peter in the Collection. Adrian arrives to shatter Mirror Benny. They try to race down into the planet to save Benny and Jason.

Meanwhile Benny is about to do something stupid and go through the mirror again, against Jason's advice. Carnivel ends up pushing Benny through the mirror and Adrian arrives, jumping through it. Jason admits to being scared and not trusting what's on the other side of the mirror.

Me: Jason's thinking smart.

Tim: Yep.

Jason gets the brush off from Brax regarding any past experience Brax has had with the mirror. He then hears Mirror Benny crying out for him and he rushes to her. He gets a bit of wish fullfillment as Mirror Benny tells him that she loves him, that Peter is a part of him. They kiss a few times until she morphs into Adrian. Insert fight scene ala' Amok Time until Jason destroys Mirror Adrian via his anger. Carnivel arrives all impressed with his use of the force. Then Jason gets all nine kinds of dead sexy vocally as he asks Carnivel if Benny has really told her just how much they love each other.

Tim: (as Jason) Did she tell you about how we got married and had all these Doctor Who characters as our guests?

Jason slowly slips into madness as he reasons that the only way to fix things is to blow the mirror up. He'd rather kill Benny then let her live and possibly hook up with Adrian.

Me: Here's Johnny!

Benny is on the run and ends up facing four mirrors, Mirror Jason, and another Mirror Adrian. Mirror Jason tells Benny how much he needs her and Mirror Adrian says she should be with him since he's the father of her baby. Both ask for a kiss.

Me: Seriously, Jason is downright sexy at this point. (looks at Tim) It's a girl thing, okay! You guys get your companions and Benny. Until Jason all I had was Adric, Harry Sullivan, and Turlough.

Tim: (As Heamavores) Everyone wants to come into the mirror.

Benny eventually finds her mirror self and learns what's going on. Brax is busy espousing to Carnivel why he cares about Benny and not Jason or Adrian. Carnivel calls him "Cardinal Braxiatel". After destroying Carnivel Brax decides to save Jason.

Adrian wakes up to a mirror version of himself showing up.

Tim: It's pop up video.


Jason figures it all out regarding Brax's dark nature. Jason reminds him he was off in the alternate dimension after Dellah was destroyed so he wasn't there when Brax set up the Collection. Realising he's been rumbled Brax hypnotises Jason into forgetting the last few minutes and to suffer migraines if he gives any serious thought to Brax's ulterior motives. It works but Jason is still intent on destroying to mirror to let Benny and Adrian stay together.

Me: He probably should've added a bit about forgetting about Benny and Adrian.

Benny is trying to convince Mirror Benny not to impregnate her by noting it's not cricket.

Tim: Rape: It's just not cricket.


Brax is still trying to talk Jason out of blowing up the mirror.

Tim: (as Brax) I'm not a nice man.


Jason utters a "goddess" as Benny gets knocked up by Mirror Benny.

Me: Is that a double drink for the Benny drinking game?


Tim: I don't know. I guess.


Brax says they have to do something to save Benny and Jason takes this to mean he should arm the explosives. Tim finishes up the announcement by the explosives that they have five minutes to get away.

Me: That might be the nicest explosives announcement I've ever heard.


Jason gets his first migraine as Brax and Adrian rescue Benny from the mirror. Brax challenges Dr. Phil as he talks sense into Benny regarding where she belongs. They barely make it back to the Collection via another mirror where Jason promptly collapses due to his Brax induced migraine.

Tim: That was one big mind fuck of an audio play.


Me: As as friend once said in regards to Memento "This is fucked up as a soup sandwich on a rainy day."

Tim: Strangely enough I was able to follow that one easier than the others. If David Lynch directed a Benny play this is what you'd get.


Me: Amazing performances all the way around, with Harry Myers and Stephen Fewell really getting a chance to do something a bit different as their mirror selves. We get the beginning of the Dark Brax storyline which gets mined for years to come. This is probably the first audio since Just War that shows just how complex and far reaching Benny audios can be.

Look, here's some stuff we're pimping. It's gotta go somewhere so why not at the end this time for something different? Did you watch the olympics? Are you wondering how London can top China for the opening ceremonies in 2012? Someone has come up with an option. David Tennant lighting the cauldron dressed as the Doctor. Check out the petition here.

A trailer is up for episode three of the ninth season of Benny, The Adventure of the Diogenes Damsel.

Wil Wheaton is the man. Not only does he speak wisdom when he says you shouldn't be a dick, but he's done reviews of the first half of the first season of Star Trek: The Next Generation episodes over at TV Squad. He also got an awesome black velvet painting of Wesley Crusher which you can see at his website. No seriously, I can't make this shit up.

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Monday, August 18, 2008

Everything You Wanted to Know About Brax...

...was not written by me. Someone going by the handle of Lizbee on livejournal has done an awesome job of making sense of Brax's timeline here. Check the entire blog out, it's pretty darn good. Not only do they like Brax but they write pretty decent Doctor Who fanfiction and even a story involving Benny. If you like it a lot vote for it here.

You might've noticed we've got a cute little logo now. Thanks to Bob #3 for putting this together. Not bad for his first time using some program called Gimp. It's in its infancy though so expect it to change another time or two as we work towards what I really would love to have for a logo. But for now gaze lovingly at our cute first logo.

Not so cute is an ugly button you might've noticed asking you to be a part of my blog network on Facebook. The button was kind of nasty to begin with and then I made it less nasty through trial and error with code. It is clear though that the year I spent dating a computer programmer in college didn't teach me anything in that department. Ignore its nastiness though and embrace its message. Join us on Blog Networks on Facebook and help further my aim for world domination.

Big Finish has their own forums up and running. That seems to be the place where you can chat with your favorite Big Finish folks like Barnaby Edwards and talk all things audio in nature.

We're still on target for a full session on the 31st of August so tune back later that evening. That's the beginning of a week of vacation so I'm trying to do a Sapphire and Steel session and maybe some more solo stuff.