Ace of Spades HQ

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December 30, 2004

Happy Blogoversary to Me!

Okay, I jumped the gun yesterday -- forgot which day I started this blog on -- but I can now say that this blog has officially turned one year old.

As I've said, I started this blog because I'd been reading blogs for a while -- especially Instapundit, for links, and Steven den Beste, for the most amazing essays on the Internet -- and because I got annoyed that Oliver Willis, who is not-funny and not-insightful, was getting attention and I wasn't. And of course because I happened to read an article on Dec 29th or Dec 30th about how easy it was to start a blog now because of Blogger's software.

And because I'd actually met a real live blogger. She said, off-handedly, "Oh, you can read about that on my blog," and I determined at that moment that I, too, needed to be able to say, off-handedly, "I'm sorry, but I've already completely discarded that spurious claim on my blog."

Son of Nixon, it turns out, had read the same article, and he called me up to tell me he wanted to start a blog a mere two hours after I'd started my own. And boy, did we have some chuckles for a full month, as we'd just slip into conversation "Yeah, you can find that information on my blog" and then giggle like schoolgirls about it.

At any rate, Ace of Spades started out with this amazing blast in the etherspace -- a missive I like to call "First Post" -- and then the quality just got even better with this potty-mouthed reworking of Poe's The Raven.

I originally had a different schtick for the blog. I never said "I think" in the beginning; it was "We think." Because I was claiming that this wasn't a one-man operation, but rather a lavishly funded 644-man operation consisting chiefly of Gulf War special forces veterans and ex-CIA operatives, being run out of the luxurious Ace of Spades HQ corporate offices on the secret 103rd floor of the Empire State Building, all under the control of a secretive and mysterious rightwing benefactor we only knew as "Mr. Tranh."

I dropped that sometime after I moved to Mu.Nu. Trouble is, I only occasionally did anything with the schtick, and it turns out that 80% of readers didn't even know it was the schtick. They just hadn't heard of it, and they just thought I was being a pompous dick for always saying "We."

Anyway, if you read early posts and find me saying "we," that's why. I wasn't crazy and I wasn't using the royal we. I was just doing a comic riff that apparently only I and six other people even knew about.

I guess today I'll be doing a Best of Ace through the day, in between blogging about other crap. It'll be both my actual best stuff, and the most important moments in the blog-- important in terms of getting Big Links.

I won't be doing that Hey, Remember The Last Year of Blogging? thing I'd teased, because I really can't think of a lot of funny things for the Lisa Loeb Chick from Blender and Sebastian Bach to say about my site. If they never say anything funny, how can I be expected to make up funny things for them to say?

At any rate, thanks again for reading this site. It's really very satisfying to put up some nonsense and have other people read it, and occasionally even enjoy it.

Thanks to Carnivorous Conservative! ... for providing me with a new banner, which I think I'll use at least for the Blogoversary.

I don't know if I like the font he's chosen for the title, and I really liked the Garamond font for the Mencken quote, but baby, you cannot find fault with that kick-ass death card!

posted by Ace at 11:27 AM

Comments

Congratulations, Ace. Not even Vinny Falcone could have done a better job.

Posted by: Christopher on December 30, 2004 11:52 AM

Congrats. Now that the Commissar has joined me in limbo and Goldstein is making noises about playing video games, it's pretty much all on you, Ace. Don't let us down, bro.

Posted by: Allah on December 30, 2004 11:57 AM

Allah,

Thanks. As far as one of the big moments of the site, you're one of them, of course. Mind if I mention that? You know what I mean, I think-- you originally didn't want me to say what you were doing for me.

Posted by: ace on December 30, 2004 12:07 PM

Now, uh, about those flaming skulls you promised us...

Posted by: someone on December 30, 2004 12:14 PM

Is it just me, or does that new cigarette-smoking skull look a hell of a lot like Hunter S. Thompson?

Posted by: senator philabuster on December 30, 2004 12:20 PM

Happy Blogiversary, Ace!

I agree about the Garamond, and the quote is kinda lost in the background a bit, but the header typestyle definitely got my attention and reminds me of the scythe in the AoS card. It works.

Posted by: Joan of Argghh! on December 30, 2004 12:23 PM

Happy Blogiversary, Ace. Believe me, the InnerwebnetAOL is better for your writing.

Posted by: Margi on December 30, 2004 12:28 PM

That new banner is BAD ASS

Posted by: TallDave on December 30, 2004 12:51 PM

Senator Philabuster is right on the money. Its like HST was looking into a mirror, if in fact I was a mirror and not someone wasting time at work.

Happy B-Day, Ace.

Posted by: Jersey Matt on December 30, 2004 12:55 PM

Happy blogoversary Ace! And, thanks for the linky love yesterday :)

Posted by: Carin on December 30, 2004 01:00 PM

Congrats Ace. Thanks for making my internet year!

Best wishes for a healthy, safe, and fun 2005.

Cheers,
Dave at Garfield Ridge

Posted by: Dave at Garfield Ridge on December 30, 2004 02:01 PM

Congratulations. I think a table dance from Kim Richards is in order.

I'll thow in ten bucks, if Allah and Goldstein agree to cover the rest.

Posted by: iowahawk on December 30, 2004 02:17 PM

Congrats, Ace. And the new banner is pretty cool, but my first thought was that the new font for the blog title is very D&D-esque. I swear I have a "Fighter's handbook" or something around here with that exact same font on the cover.

Posted by: francisthegreat on December 30, 2004 03:34 PM

Let's be honest, you just wanted me -- and the rest of the blogosphere -- to link to you two days with congratulatory posts so you could steal all our traffic.

Posted by: Digger on December 30, 2004 06:57 PM

Great Blog.

Posted by: BULLSEYE on January 1, 2005 06:25 PM

Amazon.com Widgets

Now Available!
The Deplorable Gourmet
A Horde-sourced Cookbook
[All profits go to charity]

Top Headlines

In more marketing for Project Hail Mary, scientists say they've found the biosigns indicating life growing on an alien planet. It's not proof, just signatures of chemicals that are produced by biological metabolism, and it could be nothing, but scientists think it's a strong sign that this planet is inhabited by something.

In a paper published in the Astrophysical Journal Letters, a team of scientists announced the detection of dimethyl sulfide (along with a similar detection of dimethyl disulfide) in the atmosphere of an exoplanet called K2-18b. This is actually the second detection of dimethyl sulfide made on this planet, following a tentative detection in 2023.
Tons of chemicals are detected in the atmospheres of celestial objects every day. But dimethyl sulfide is different, because on Earth, it's only produced by living organisms.
"It is a shock to the system," Nikku Madhusudhan, first author on the paper, told the New York Times. "We spent an enormous amount of time just trying to get rid of the signal."

He means they tried to prove the signal was caused by things other than dimethyl sulfide but they could not.

Artemis moon shot a go, scheduled for 6:24 Eastern time tonight
Great marketing arranged by Amazon to promote Project Hail Mary. Okay not really but it does work out that way.

TJM talks John Boorman, director of Excalibur

Good rickroll

What? Skeleton of the most famous Musketeer, D'Artagnan, possibly discovered in Dutch church closet.
Dumas picked four names of real musketeers out of a history book, D'Artagnan, Athos, Aramis, and Porthos. So there was an actual D'Artagnan, though he made most of the story up. (Or, you know, all of it.)*

Charles de Batz de Castelmore, known as d'Artagnan, the famous musketeer of Kings Louis XIII and Louis XIV, spent his life in the service of the French crown.
The Gascon nobleman inspired Alexandre Dumas's hero in "The Three Musketeers" in the 19th century, a character now known worldwide thanks to the novel and numerous film adaptations.
D'Artagnan was killed during the siege of Maastricht in 1673, and there is a statue honoring the musketeer in the city. His final resting place has remained a mystery ever since.

A lot of Dumas's stories are based on bits of real history. The plot of the >Three Musketeers, about trying to recover lost diamonds from the queen's necklace, was cribbed from the then-almost-contemporaneous Affair of the Queen's Necklace. And the Man in the Iron Mask is based on real accounts of a prisoner forced to wear a mask (though I think it was a velvet mask).
* Oh, I should mention, Dumas says all this, about finding the names in an old book, in the prologue to his novel. But authors lie a lot. They frequently present fictions as based on historic fact. The twist is, he was actually telling the truth here. At least about these four musketeers having actually existed and served under Louis XIV.
Fun fact: You know the beginning of A Fistful of Dollars where the local gunslingers make fun of Clint Eastwood's donkey and Eastwood demands they apologize to the donkey? That's lifted from The Three Musketeers. Rochefort mocks D'Artagnan's old, brokedown farm horse and D'Artagnan is incensed.

A commenter asked which should be read first, The Hobbit of LOTR?
Easy, no question -- read The Hobbit first. It's actually the start of the story and comes first chronologically. It sets up some major characters and major pieces in play in LOTR.
Also, the Hobbit is Beginner-Friendly, which LOTR isn't. The Hobbit really is a delightful book, and a fast read. It's chatty, it's casual, it's exciting, and it's funny. In that dry cheeky British humor way. I love that the narrator is constantly making little asides and commentary, like he's just sitting next to you telling you this story as it occurs to him.
LOTR is a very long story. Fifteen hundred pages or so. The Hobbit is relatively short and very punchy and easy to read. If you don't like The Hobbit, you can skip out on LOTR. If you do like it, you'll be primed to read LOTR.
Oh, I should say: The Hobbit is written as if it's for children, but one of those smart children's stories that are also for adults. Don't worry, there's also real fighting and violence and horror in it, too.
LOTR is written for adults. (It's said that Tolkien wrote both for his children, but LOTR was written 17 years later, when his children were adults.) Some might not like The Hobbit due to its sometimes frivolous tone. Me, I love it. I find it constantly amusing. Both are really good but there is a starkly different tone to both. LOTR is epic, grand, and serious, about a world war, The Hobbit is light and breezy, and about a heist. Though a heist that culminates in a war for the spoils.

The Hobbit Challenge: Read two more chapters. I didn't have much time. Bilbo got the ring.
I noticed a continuity problem. Maybe. Now, as of the time of The Hobbit, it was unknown that this magic ring was in fact a Ring of Power, and it was doubly unknown that it was the Ring of Power, the Master Ring that controlled the others.
But the narrator -- who we will learn in LOTR was none of than Bilbo himself, who wrote the book as "There and Back Again" -- says this about Gollum's ring:
"But who knows how Gollum had come by that present [the Ring], ages ago in the old days when such rings were still at large in the world? Perhaps even the Master who ruled them could not have said."
In another passage, the ring is identified as a "ring of power."
I don't know, I always thought there was a distinction between mere magic rings and the Rings of Power created by Sauron. But this suggests that Bilbo knew this was a ring of power created by Sauron.
Now I don't remember when Bilbo wrote the Hobbit. In the movie, he shows Frodo the book in Rivendell, and I guess he wrote it after he left the Shire. I guess he might have added in the part about the ring being a ring of power created by "the Master" after Gandalf appraised him of his research into the ring.
I never noticed this before. I know Tolkien re-wrote this chapter while he was writing LOTR to make the ring important from the start. And also to make Gollum more sinister and evil, and also to remove the part where Gollum actually offers Bilbo the ring as a "present" -- Bilbo had already found it on his own, but Gollum was wiling to give it away, which obviously is not something the rewritten Gollum would ever do.
But I had no memory of the ring being suggested to be The Ring so early in the tale.

Finish the job, Mr. President!
Melanie Phillips lays out the case for the total destruction of the Iranian government and armed forces. [CBD]

TJM acts like he knows anything about John Wick and screenwriting. It's embarrassing, really.

Podcast: Sefton and CBD talk about how would a peace treaty with Iran work, Democrats defending murderers and rapists, The GOP vs. Dem bench for 2028, composting bodies? And more!

Oh, I forgot to mention this quote from Pete Hegseth, reported by Roger Kimball: "We are sharing the ocean with the Iranian Navy. We're giving them the bottom half."

Batman fires The Batman
Batman is disgusted by the Joachim Phoenix version of Joker
Batman tries to fire Superman
Batman is still workshopping his Bat-Voice

Forgotten 80s Mystery Click: Red Leather Suit and Sweatband Edition
And I was here to please
I'm even on knees
Makin' love to whoever I please
I gotta do it my way
Or no way at all

Tomorrow is March 25th, "Tolkien Reading Day," because March 25th is the day when the Ring is destroyed in the book. I think I'm going to start the Hobbit tomorrow and read all four books this time.
The only bad part of the trilogy are the Frodo/Sam chapters in The Two Towers. They're repetitive, slow, and mostly about the weather and terrain. But most everything else is good. Weirdly, the Frodo-Sam chapters in Return of the King are exciting and action-packed and among the best in the trilogy. (Though the chapters with everyone else in Return of the King get pretty slow again. Mostly people talking about marching towards war, and then marching towards war.)

Sec. Army recognizes ODU Army ROTC cadets for their bravery and sacrifice in private ceremony
[Hat Tip: Diogenes] [CBD]

TJM gives you a brief tour of his movie collection.

Forgotten 80s Mystery Click
One day I'm gonna write a poem in a letter
One day I'm gonna get that faculty together
Remember that everybody has to wait in line
Oh, [Song Title], look out world, oh, you know I've got mine

US decimation of Iran's ICBM forces is due to Space Force's instant detection of launches -- and the launchers' hiding places -- and rapid counter-attack via missiles
AI is doing a lot of the work in analyzing images to find the exact hiding place of the launchers. Counter-strikes are now coming in four hours after a launch, whereas previously it might have taken days for humans to go over the imagery and data.

Robert Mueller, Former Special Counsel Who Probed Trump, Dies

“robert mueller just died,” trump wrote in a truth social post on march 21. “good, i’m glad he’s dead. he can no longer hurt innocent people! president donald j. trump.”

TJM has thoughts on Superheros and Iconography