Ten of a Kind: Too Many Supergirls (or: "I Do Not Kara Tall for This Development!")

(More Ten of a Kind here.)

Zzzzzz...snort...zzzz...

Zzzzzzzzz...zzz...snort...snort!



Uh! Oh! Oh! I fell asleep! I fell asleep and now it is past ten in the evening! Oh no! The bookstores have all closed again and now I won't be able to get my copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows! Oh nooooooo.



Wait a minute...what's that? What's this?



Could it be...?



Yes! Yes! It is! It's Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows!!!!



All was well.

IITB I(S BOOKSTSOR ETIME HIOORAYY

IIT IJS TIME TO GETW UP AND GOT TO BOKKSTORE

YAYAY ITTSS IS SMORNOJGN GET NUP JHOHN AND ATAKE ME TOK BOOKKSTORE

HOORAY IHOORAYAYY

HARRYYYYYB POPITTETETTTTTERRRRrrrrrrrrrrr rrrrr rrr zz zz

zz...

zzzzzzzzzz...

ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

HEEY TEH SUN IS COMMING UUP

HEY THE SUSN N IS COMNIOG UP

IT B INS XDAYTIME IT IS STAUEDXAY MOIRNTG

CMONNNF WAKEN YUP JOHN WKA EUP IT ISS SATURDAY MORNJGN

IT BIS TIME T O GO TOT THE BOOKTGSOLRE TO GET IN L IN E FOR HARRYB PPOTRERE

SUNN INS OUTN SO PLEASEE GETNBUP ANBDN TAKE ME TO THE BOOKKSTYORE PLEEEEEESSSEEE

HAygsk terafu pbnah

i wnana gsftoa, nvzrtgs

wan fweosn tbavs leoafan[a lasgt of teh nnamm!!!%$&!!%$& WHYWYY


HYHA WNNAA HAHRTY PIOTTERR

i wnana go skleep

i wnanana gop sleep

iim so tired soos verty very tred but i cant gio tgo s,eep

WHYB CANATB I GO SLEEP?!!^&&*@

hellp i am scared

i think i hear ZOMBIES coming down teh street i thin k ZOBMIES are coming to get mee

please come up sun pelase make it daytime soon PLEEZE

why isnt it saturdy morning yet i want to go to sleep i wan it to be DAYTMIE

i wanna go to SLEEEP

adn i think i drabnk too much ovatltine

Oh wait...

...this isn't Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Askaban...

It's Zombies of Mora-Tau (1957): "Sailors try to salvage a sunken treasure guarded by zombie seamen."

Cool.

Yawnnnnnn.

I am tired. I am very tired. I am very very tired. My eyes are heavy and I can barely stay awake. I have such good positive thinking about being tired that I'm sure I will go to sleep any seco

Hey, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban is on cable now! Brilliant.

Wow, there is really nothing good on TV at 3:30 in the morning.

And what's on mostly stars Danny Bonaduce.

Separated at Birth: Hedwig and the Angry Yo-Yo

Well, I'm wide awake, so now is as good a time as any to do the usual Saturday Separated at Birth:

L: panel from The Books of Magic #1 (1990), written by Neil Gaiman, art by John Bolton
R: movie still from Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (2001), based on the novel by J. K. Rowling (published June 1997)

Lest you misunderstand: absolutely no fingers hooves pointed. Neil himself "has been quoted as saying that any similarities between the two are largely superficial and most likely reflect the fact that both draw on common archetypes." (Wikipedia). And I like both, an awful, awful lot.

Just, always remember:

It's very quiet and everyone has gone to sleep. 'Cept me.

I wonder where John keeps the Oreos? And maybe I will make myself some Ovaltine. I'm sure that will relax me.

Hey, maybe I will re-read Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince again. I re-read it earlier this week but p'raps now I will pick up some clues about what will happen in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, don't you think?

Sometimes when you aren't sleepy, reading a book will put you right to sleep. I'm sure that will work for me. I just have to stop being so overexcited and jittery. Morning will come very fast if I can just relax!

Mmmmm, Ovaltine.

It is after midnight!

It's Saturday! It's after midnight! I am up and looking out the window and there are kids and adults on the street coming back from the bookstore and some of them are wearing wizard hats and waving wands and they are heading home and the have bookstore bags with big books stuffed inside them and they are laughing and smiling and so happy...

I am pressing my nose up against the window pane and hoping maybe someone will see me and bring me a copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Maybe if someone bought two by accident and...well, maybe if they don't want that extra copy, they will bring it up to me and...

Sigh. Back to bed. This time I will go to sleep for sure.

A little poem about Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

Oh Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows,
Your exciting adventures I'd truly follow
You're a book I'd love to keep
If only I could get to sleep!

Okay. Okay. This time for sure. G'night everybody!

Urggggggggggg I can't sleep!

C'mon c'mon c'mon c'mon c'mon c'mon

I WANNA GO TO SLEEEEEEEEP!

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

Didja ever notice the harder you try to go to sleep...

...the more awake you are?

So, I shall fool Mister Morpheus by using reverse psychology on him. I will be awake now! Ho hum, I am not going to go to sleep at all. Here I am lying in bed in my fuzzy pajamas but I am going to stay wide awake! Don't you sprinkle sand in my little button eyes, you inverse-word-ballooned Robert Smith-look-alike! This little stuffed bull is wide awake! Haw!

Also, on second reflection p'raps it wasn't the best idea to have those three Starbuck's frappuccinos at 7:15 PM.

Okay, it surely must be past midnight by now.

(gets up, trots over to the clock, peers at it carefully)

Grrrrrrrrr.

(trots back to bed)

I'm just up getting a cup of water.

Don't mind me. I'll be asleep any moment now, and then...it'll be Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows time!

Slurp. Slurp. Mmmmm, good water. And now...to sleep!

What's that noise? Is it Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows?

What's that noise outside? I heard children laughing and shouting outside so I had to get out of bed, where I was just getting ready to go to sleep. I had to peer out of the blinds and see if maybe they had gotten ahold of their copies of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows yet. It's hard to tell even with my binoculars, so I started looking in the windows of the apartments across the street to see if anyone over there was reading it yet. Then John came in and took away my binoculars and told me if I kept doing that the neighbors will be calling the police on me, and despite my protests that I was just surveying the neighborhood for any early sign of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows activity, he sent me off to bed again. "It'll be morning before you know it, kiddo," he said, patting me on the head and tucking me in. "You go to sleep now."

I am trying now very hard to go to sleep.

I will be asleep any moment now.

Well, I'm still awake. I rolled over a bit in bed and stared at the ceiling for quite some time but I could not get to sleep, so I hopped out of bed and trotted over to my laptop to see if maybe while I was in bed they decided to release Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows four hours early, but no such luck.

John has looked up from watching Flight of the Conchords and said to me "I thought you were going to bed early tonight, Bully." I fixed him with my very stern stare and said "I am already in bed but simply taking a short break from sleeping," and then trotted back quickly with my laptop under my arm, just in case there is some breaking HP-early release news.

I am now going to totally go to sleep. When I wake up it will be morning and time to go to get Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Goodnight, everyone! Sweet dreams! I shall be dreaming of Quidditch and Cho Chang myself.

The Waiting is the Hardest Part

I am as anxious and as excited as a long-tailed cat in a room full of long-tailed cat squishing machines, because tomorrow is The Big Day! No, it's not the day I get to change the filter in the Brita water pitcher! Oh wait. Yes, it is that day tomorrow, but that's not what I'm so excited about. Well, at least not as excited as I am about this: the newest and final Harry Potter book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, is coming out tomorrow! Hoo hoo!

I am the biggest little stuffed Harry Potter fan in the world (yes, even more so than my Mugglenet.com discussion board archrival, stufflepuff_giraffe23). I have read each one of the books several times from cover to cover and then back again. (Trust me, they make more sense the first way round). In case you are interested, here is my prediction about what will happen in Book Seven. I will not put up a spoiler warning because this is just me guessin', okay? So please do not sue me with your crack team of be-wigged British solicitors, Miss Rowling! I am jus' a li'l stuffed fan and not one of those scary book pirates with the eyepatches and the wooden legs and the Xerox machines. I believe that in Book Seven, Harry and Voldemort will team up to fight a greater evil. Once that is defeated, Voldemort dies, but not before making peace with Harry. Voldemort—now reborn as Tom Riddle—appears as a ghostly form alongside Dumbledore and Sirius Black as Harry and his friends dance and rejoice with a bunch of fuzzy furry beings in the forest, all singing a "yub yub" song. Fifteen years later, J. K. Rowling announces plans to a series of prequels tracking the evolution of Tom Riddle into Voldemort. Tom will accompanied on his adventures by a powerful wizard, a young Albus Dumbledore, and an annoying house-elf named "Raj-Raj."

Well, that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Bookstores all around the country are putting Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows on sale at 12:01 AM Saturday morning, which is a mere few hours away. So you'd think I'd be getting my clever little hooves on it very soon, wouldn't you? Wouldn't you? Humph. When I suggested to John that we could go down to Yavin IV Comics and wait in line to get it at midnight, he shook his head and told me that was waaaaaay past my bedtime. Also, that Yavin IV Comics is in Southern California and I live in Brooklyn. Also, that Miss Lydia is much too busy working tonight to have me hanging around showing off to her and shouting up at her "Look at me, Miss Lydia! I am doing a clever trick! Look at me, Miss Lydia!" Pfui. Miss Lydia is very kind and patient with me and always has time and a lovely pat on the head for me.

In any case, because John is a big meanie and that every kid in America will have a jump start on me in reading HP7, I am not allowed to stay up tonight and have to wait until tomorrow to go to the bookstore with my change purse full of dimes. I am very very very very very excited about it and cannot wait for tomorrow to come. I will be first in line when the bookstore opens tomorrow, standing waiting with my croissant and cup of coffee, peering into the window while Henry Mancini's "Moon River" plays on my iPod. Precisely at 10 AM I shall march proudly into the store at the head of the by-now-long-line. I shall slide my dimes on the counter and say in a very casual and debonair tone, "Please may I buy a copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows?" And the very cute bookstore sales clerk girl will smile at me and ruffle my fur and coo, "Of course you may, you cute little stuffed bull! And you do not even have to share it with your sister, Marshall, who is a much slower reader than you are and will hog the book for days. Also, here are some very special free bookmarks!" Then she will ring it up and put it in a bag and i shall sprint home and lay on the couch all day with my be-ringed nose buried in the massive nose, only emerging periodically to take a bite of my buttered crumpet or sip my cup of tea. Yes, that is what tomorrow shall be like. I can see it now.

Therefore, while I know it's very early, I'm going to go to bed right now, in order that I will fall asleep quickly and tomorrow morning shall come all the faster! It's a trick that I have used many times on days where I wish the morning would come all the faster: Christmas, Halloween, my birthday. And it never works, but in the words of my favorite cartoon spokesmoose, this time fer shure!

So, here I go off, yawning, with my stuffed owl under my arm, to climb into bed. Even though the sun is still out right now, I shall be asleep in a matter of seconds, and the night will pass faster than the Nimbus 2001 in regulation tournament Quidditch play. Next time you hear from me, I will be happily reading away in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, so come and get me, Mister Morpheus: I'm all ready for ya!

Friday Night Fights: Two Great Tastes That Taste Great Together

Some people like rich milk chocolate...or maybe crunchy rock candy...

All panels in this post are from Fantastic Four: The World's Greatest Comic Magazine #2
(March 2001), script by Chuck Dixon, art in this panel by Paul Ryan and Al Milgrom


Other folks prefer creamy peanut butter...or, possibly chewy, tangy salt water taffy...

Art in this panel and the next by Frank Fosco and Bruce Timm


...But there's nothing compared to the delicious super team-up of the pair: the Reese's Peanut Butter Cup, or, in the Marvel Universe, two fighting powerhouses, each with their own distinct catchphrases, punching a big-ass Kree robot to kingdom come:


Balactus can take a sunrise, sprinkle it in dew, cover it in chocolate and a miracle or two.

Dumbass things you shouldn't do in the Marvel Universe, Number 48

Don't worry your pretty li'l heads, folks, he ain't hurt...
...he's just a dumbass:

All panels in this post are from the legendary Fantastic Four #48 (March 1966),
written by Stan Lee, art by Jack Kirby and Joe Sinnott

Let's Do Math! (with The Mighty Avengers!)

Thor > Hulk.



Nick Fury ≠ Marcus Welby, M.D.



Having Captain America and Rick Jones ≠ Keeping Captain America and Rick Jones.



Thor < Hulk.



No one > Hulk.



(Yellowjacket x 2) = Captain America.



Thor > mortal man.



(Thor - Mjolnir) + 60 seconds = Don Blake.



Hulk > everyone.



Captain America ≠ Captain Midnight.



Hawkeye - (bow + arrow) > Rick Jones.



Thor > Hulk.



Tsetse fly:elephant :: Captain America:Man-Ape



Solve for y: If a is b, where a = Captain Mar-Vell and b = spy, then x is y, where x = Rick Jones.

(Answer: y = Joe Cocker.)



Hulk = Thor!



Avengers = jerks.

Calling All She-Hulks

Hollywood casting directors take note! Here's two actual and unrelated photos from the two major New York City weekly magazines:

From Time Out New York #614 (July 6-11, 2007), their "Green" (environmental) theme issue gives them a chance to have a supposedly clever visual pun by featuring a green woman in their "Public Eye" New Yorker on the street feature: Lisa Brescia, actress who plays Elphaba, the Wicked Witch of the West, in Broadway's Wicked:


...and from New York (July 16, 2007), a (color-tinted) photo of the ex-Mrs. Salman Rushdie, Padma Lakshmi, Photoshopped viridian to accompany a short "Intelligencer" gossip article about her environmentally-responsible (i.e., green) luxury penthouse duplex:


I didn't pick up The New Yorker this week, but if it didn't look like this, I don't wanna know about it:

KITTUHZ ON TEH KEYZ

(Confused? See Dorian.)