What I Do For Fun

(Or: "Back off man! I'm on a radioactive high!")

We all have our own ways of winding down, relaxing, and not-doing-anything-related-to-work. This is by no means an exhaustive summary of my interests but it will give you a good idea of what I like to do for personal entertainment.

Pursuits

I don't really have any traditional hobbies such as collecting stamps or restoring antique furniture. I do have a strong passion for Science Fiction in its mydrid forms. I also love to play with computers. And even though I'm not very knowledble about engineering, I have a constant, nearly unquenchible desire to know How Things Work, take devices apart, and fiddle around with mechanics.

My mother says that it all started when I stuck my finger in a light socket at a very young age. Apparently, ever since then I've had a strange attraction to electrical things.

Computers

My Own Frankenstein - The homepage for my personal computer.

Electricity

Electricity is cool. Things that use electricity are cool. I'm one of those people who finds nothing unusual about loping off to oggle the local power plant at 3am in the morning.

Basics of Electricity - For the beginners.
Lightning and Atmospheric Electricity - Lots of cool information on lightning research, including space observations of lightning events, field validtion events, and so on.
UF's Lightning Research Lab - Part of the Electrical and Computer Engineering college. Check out the killer photos and read about how these guys get to use rockets to trigger actual lightning strikes! Also check out this overview for a quick look.
Philip Loarie - Lightning Photographer.
Auroras - Which are, of course, just huge sheets of electrical energy! *

Australia

Fire

Fire is pretty cool too. Actually, I like plasma of all sorts. I want to get a plasma spraygun so I can layer my computer and keyboard case in a fine layer of glass or maybe obsidian.

No, really.

I worked briefly (one week) for a company as a fire extinguisher recharger. It's about as much fun as butchering pigs, though a lot drier.

Great Balls Of Fire - Some plasma basics
Plasmaphysics - Where there's fire (or plasma), sometimes there's fusion.
Volcanos - An important source of fire, plasma, lava, intense heat, etc.
Live Volcano! - Yes! A live camera view of active volcano Etna! Note: You may have to manually reload the page to get updates.
Grill Lighting - An exceptionally creative and unique way to start a BBQ. YOU MUST VIEW THIS! Dave Barry (yes, The Dave Barry) wrote about this site in his column and caused massive traffic problems for Purdue. Let's here it for Barry and George! WHOOOOH!!
Plasma on Internet - Large collection of plasma-related sites.

And So On

Nanotechnology - I'm completely fascinated by the idea of microscopic machinery.

Entertainment Media

An array of links for some of my favorite media-based entertainments.

Movies

In no particular order, my top favorite movies of all time.

Alien
Aliens
Blade Runner
The Blues Brothers
Clerks
Eat The Rich
Halloween
The First Star Wars Trilogy
The Terminator Movies

Movie Companies

Half the fat and twice the quality!

View-Askew Productions - Kevin Smith's production company - makers of "Clerks", "Mallrats", "Chasing Amy", and "Dogma".
HandMade Films - The producers of various Monty Python movies, as well as some fantastic sleeper films.
Mirimar - Mind's Eye video series and other computer animations.

Favorite Movie People

John Carpenter - I've seen just about every movie that John Carpenter has made (yes, including Dark Star). Some of them aren't so great but the ones that are I really enjoy. I also admire John for his tenacity in movie production, and his multi-facted approach. Not only does he write screenplays & stories, he produces, directs, and even scores and performs soundtracks... And while it's easy to stereotype him as a horror movie producer, he's made such classics as Star Man, Big Trouble In Little China, and of course Dark Star.
Arnold Schwarznegger - I like Arnie movies, I freely admit it. I don't consider Arnold to be a great actor, by any stretch of the imagination. Hell, neither does Arnold! But he can be funny (at least to laugh at), looks impressive, and actually turned in some good performances, especially as a Cyberdine Systems Model T-800.
Gale Ann Hurd - Gale is a compelling force behind many excellent films. When she was married to James Cameron, she did production work with him on the original Terminator film, as well as Aliens. Eventually they divorced but she continues to do excellent work in the movie industry. The films she is involved in pretty much invariablly feature strong female roles.

The Internet Movie Database

The Internet Movie Database just plain rocks. Tons of detailed info on anything related to movies, acters, producers... Plus detailed coverage of a vast number of TV shows and just about all of the Looney Tune cartoon shorts!

Television

I don't watch TV as much as I used to. Which is probably a good thing. Bu I do have my favorites.

Babylon 5
Black Adder
Cheers - I hardly see this show anymore, and I suspect I've seen every episode several times. But it was a truely funny and original network sitcom.
Dr. Who
Monty Python's Flying Circus
Mystery Science Theatre 3000 - It's simply amazing how intense the fandom is for this show. It makes Star Trek seem like, well, crass and blatent commercialism (which it is).
Night Court
Red Dwarf
The Simpsons
Futurama
Star Trek - In all it's many flavors...
Twin Peaks

Music

My musical interests are varied, though they tend to be in the range of what I prefer to call "Metal" or "Heavy Metal". I can't begin to present a full list of all the albums I own, nevermind all the artists I enjoy. Here's the major highlights, though.

Artists

AC/DC
Anthrax
Black Sabbath
My Dark Angel page - I love the band and scoured the net to find information on them, but couldn't find any homepage anywhere. So I ended up making my own. As far as I know, it's still the only homepage in the entire world dedicated to the band, which seems unusual for a major metal band that produced multiple albums with a major record company.
Metallica - Though after their most recent album, I'm pretty much losing interest in 'em.
Megadeth
Mordred - Obscure band, broke up a long time ago. But an interesting blend of metal and rap-like sounds.
Overkill
Slayer
Kreator
Motorhead
Suicidal Tendencies
Pantera
Sound Garden
Type O-Negative
Iron Maiden
Judas Priest
Manowar
Ozzy Osbourne
Queensryche
S.O.D.
White Zombie

Favorite Albums

Specific albums that I really enjoy.

The Judgement Night soundtrack.
The Spawn soundtrack.

Books

Read! READ READ READ!!

Titles

Neuroamancer by William Gibson
Snow Crash by Neil Stephenson

Authors

Kevin O'Donnell, Jr. - Author of the McGill Feighan series.
Robert L. Forward - Scientist and hard Science Fiction author.
Tim Powers
Terry Pratchett - Oook!
Pat Cadigan - Underrated cyberpunkish author.

Last Modified: June 30th, 1999
Jeff The Riffer aka Jeff Mercer / riffer@vaxer.net