Tinker, Tailor ... Mossad Murphy?

I'm a little behind this week, so, sorry that everything is slow.  This post will be a short one.

Numerous times when writing about Scott Murphy, I've made reference to another fictional character, George Smiley.  Originally a character in a John Le Carre spy novel, Smiley was a plain little man, in a plain little suit, who tried to offend no one, only answered questions with questions, and was no one really important.

Except that he was a spy.  He taught them, he ran them, he designed plans for them.  In some of Le Carre's books, Smiley ran the entire plot from behind the scenes, and never once made an appearance.

Many, many moons ago, three of the novels that starred Smiley were put into film.  Tinker Tailer Soldier Spy was one, as well as the sequel, Smiley's People.  Both times, it starred Alec Guiness.  A third film was made, called simply A Murder of Quality, starring Denholm Elliott .... if you've ever seen the Indiana Jones films, you might know him better as Marcus Brody, one of the sidekicks.

Now, granted, Scott Murphy has a lot of differences.  He's got all sorts of tricks and tips for committing mayhem. Just don't ask him to punch anyone ... or shoot anyone farther than ten feet away ...

So, why am I explaining all of this?

Well, because they've remade Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, with a whole bunch of interesting actors. Since Guiness is dead, he's been replaced by Gary Oldman -- who I mentioned as this generation's Alec Guines not too long ago.  Smiley's sidekick is played by one Benedict Cumberbach, who BBC fans may recall from last year's Sherlock.

Now, it should be interesting to see how they play the movie, considering the original was six hours long, though my family has estimated that three hours could have been easily sliced out due to the speed of the film (eg: see Smiley walk. Walk, Smiley, walk), or due to the fact that much of the film was told in flashbacks, and stories, and interviews. The original film was interested in the methods and mechanisms of spycraft ... if one cut out a lot of that (which is repeated over, and over, and over again), then there's the plot and the character.

We'll see how it works.

Music blog: Babylon 5 & Tom Smith

This is the last cut of the music from the aborted Babylon 5 video game from last week. It was fun while it lasted.

And now, the parody version

Influential Author: Jeffery "Devious" Deaver

Jeffery Deaver has a wonderful way of messing with one's mind.

In my household, “to Deaver” something means to put a backspin on a storyline so hard that the audience gets whiplash. When I mean thriller, I mean it doesn't slow down-- at least not for long.

In my house, the man is so well known for screwing with his readers in surprise twists that whenever we see a writer radically twist everything we thought we knew about the plot, and do it fifty pages away from the ending of the book, we say that he "Deavered" the plot, or "pulled a Deaver."

The man likes to play games. Then again, he's a Fordham law school graduate, so that may have something to do with it.

Top ten blog posts for "A Pius Man."

I must admit, working at Examiner.com has gotten me used to posting lists of things. One mass email told me that top ten lists were really rather popular.

So, since blog reads tend to be down for national holidays, I've decided to do my own top ten list for the blog.

The top five are, right now, always posted on the right hand side.
Disasters to Marvel At: A Comic Discussion. -- Discussing how Marvel Evented itself to death.
Mr Phelps, You Are Disavowed… Beating up on everyone's favorite loser.
Snarky theology 3: Evolution, Creationists, and other irritants. Part of my Snarky theology series. I'm not sure why this went anywhere. Seriously, I don't think the issue is half as interesting as some seem to think.
Snarky Theology 2: FAQs about Lent. -- this one started a nice little firestorm, mainly because someone decided to, well, slightly annoy me.
DragonCon 2010, Day 2, Part 1. I have no honest idea why this is so popular. I did several DragonCon reports from last year, and this one took the cake.

Now, for the rest of the top ten list, the you haven't seen posted anywhere ... because posting a top ten list isn't an option with this blog template. :)

Inspiring Authors: J. Michael Straczynski-- Exactly as the title says. I think this one was popular because I wrote it the week Thor came out in theaters, and he was credited with the story.
Snarky Theology 4: "Things that go boink in the night." I can credit my friend Jason for this title. I mentioned I wanted the Catholic position on sex. The title was the first thing that leapt to his mind. I guess it worked
Guest Blog: Murder in the Vatican Author Ann Margaret Lewis. When I was offered the option of allowing Madam Lewis on the blog, I was asked if I wanted a guest blog, an interview, or the option of reviewing her book, I went for all of the above.
The flame war is postponed .... While the little war of Lent was ongoing (see the comment section in the Lent link above), some idiot went online, and posted the most offensive post about Japan I have ever seen. I tore her a new one. Twice.
Snarky Theology 5: The Passion, Jews, and Good Friday... I posted this because, well, it was Good Friday, and I was tired of people who got their theology from Mel Gibson's The Passion.

Anyway, I don't think I'm going to waste anyone's time with a music blog today. I doubt many would want to read it. However, June had the record for most page views of any month. Almost for any three months.

I think July might be a time to break this record.

Week in Review:7-1-2011

This week was sort of busy for me. I'm not entirely certain what happened to encourage all sorts of strange things to happen at the same time, but it did mess with my schedule a little.

Monday

Monday was especially busy. So busy that I ended up missing the daily music blog. Something I hope w

My day started with a three-part examiner.com series on being mugged: how to survive a standard mugging, what to do if you need to defend yourself and the attacker has a gun, or if he has a knife.

And, just because I could, I mentioned the top ten points to pummel someone into a new and better incarnation.

I was having fun.  Which may explain a lot of how I got the job.

Anyway.

When it came time to work on the blog, I had the self defense discussion up and ready to post. I think I had been building it for the entire month. 

And then people started to do something stupid.

For one, New York decided to allow gay marriage.  I don't think that was stupid, though I think it may be ill-advised, because I suspect that there will be lawyers. No, not "there will be blood." There will be lawyers. Which are far, far worse. I hope I'm wrong.

The blog was so good, I got a shoutout on Axes and Allies, and compliments from resident artist/atheist, Matt. 

And, of course, Image comics decided to go all tinfoil hat brigade with "The Big Lie."  Conspiracy theories, meet comic books.  Now, this was seriously stupid.

Tuesday

My fighting and writing blog. Basically, why I use Krav Maga in my fight scenes.  What is it, and where did it come from? Other various and sundry details.

Oh, by the way, if you live in and about Eastern Queens or Brooklyn, you might want to seriously look into trying out Protection Fitness Self Defense.

Trust me on this.

The music blog was E Nomine and Doctor Who ... mainly because they were both sort of awesome.

Wednesday

This was almost a last minute save. I had tripped over the music of the aborted Babylon 5 video game .... and, going by the music, if it had been made, would have been awesome ... and I tripped over it quite by accident.

And I discussed a bit more of Krav Maga, mostly where to find it in New York.

Thursday

Just the music blog.  A bit of a B5 video game, and a bit of Tom Smith.

I will most likely be taking this Fourth of July off. Enjoy everyone.

Music: Epic Video Game music

Yesterday, I started a series of music clips that should have gone with an aborted Babylon 5 video game. However, it was over an hour of music, and even what I posted yesterday was a little much.

I hope you enjoy

Music: Epic Video Game Music

In the world of video games, there are some really stupid decisions.

And then, some ideas that are dumber than others.

Babylon 5, created by J. Michael Straczynski, inspired a video game. It even came with an entire soundtrack.  Multiple soundtrack cuts, as done by why sounds like a full orchestra (I haven't looked up the data to see how much was done with Christopher Franke and the Berlin Symphony orchestra )

And then Sierra games cancelled it.  Pulling it from the shelves entirely.

Ahem .... Morons.

However, I've found over an hour's worth of the soundtrack on YouTube. It might be the whole thing.

Enjoy.

Fighting and Writing 2: Where to find Krav Maga.

Yesterday, I mentioned Krav Maga.

What sort of person would I be if I didn't point out places to go?

In Los Angeles, you have John Whitman, as I mentioned yesterday. He has literally written books on the subject of Krav Maga. Two of them. And his school is where the LAPD learn to defend themselves, so I don't think you can get much better than that.

In New York, there are a whole slew of people popping up who teach Krav Maga, especially in Manhattan. However, since, contrary to popular belief, Manhattan is not the center of the known universe, I should really focus on areas that are not Manhattan. While there are some fine places in the city, dragging gym equipment on the subway is so annoying.

Protection Fitness—open for two years, no accidents or injuries. One of my favorite instructors from my second Krav Maga school, KMLI (see below), owns and runs this particular institution. The first time I went there was the first time I went to a Krav class after a seven-month hiatus. I went into it whole hog … then I fell down. You would have thought that there were EMTs on call, they got to me so fast.

Why did I fall down? Note to self: don't fast during Lent on days you take Krav classes. Just a thought.

Since then, I have learned to defend myself against knives, and handguns, and baseball bats, and shotguns, and chokes on the ground, and knives against a wall and ...

It's fun

Recently, we went through chokes on the ground – when an attacker is both mounted on top of you (pluck the hands, buck, then roll, honest), and when the attacker is on the ground next to you, trying to kill the defender (pry the hands off of you, and unleash kicks to the head as needed).

It's filled with a lot of good stuff, and I'd suggest it highly to anyone who wants to go try Krav Maga, but doesn't want to try Manhattan.

“Top Gun Karate.” This was my first foray into the world of Krav … I'm sorry, no offense I was worried as hell.  Having “five levels” practice in the same space is problematic enough. Not to mention that all of the “lower level” students are managed by an assistant instructor who doesn't even have a teaching certification in Krav Maga. It made me nervous.

However, Dariel Williams (above) praises the owner. And I can say this for it: the week I was there, I did not see one, single injury.

KMLI (Kombat Masters of Long Island)– I went here for two years. I loved this place for quite some time.... then things started going weird. My ankle was severely sprained because of one student who got reckless. Other students started getting injured. Not through any fault of the instructors, but through sheer recklessness. Teeth were lost, corneas were scratched, shoulders dislocated. It started to look more like an ER than a training studio.

One particular moron had taken MMA, and felt compelled to show off; it took months to get rid of him, and even one instructor I respected who didn't know MMA guy by name—just as “Oh, the @$$h01e.”  Guess who helped me sprain my ankle.

I liked four instructors and took them religiously. Dr. Michael Blitz (owner), Bill Primavera, Dariel Williams, and Amy Morgenstern. Kevin Reid I had as instructor once or twice, and while I liked him, my timing sucked.

Then, Dr. Blitz stopped teaching anything below level 3. Dariel Williams now runs Protection Fitness. Bill Primavera, an excellent teacher, was put on the rotational schedule with other instructors who I disliked, which made training like Russian roulette. Or is that more like Israeli roulette?  It's been corrected since then, but I'm wary.

Either way, weird things started happening with the schedule. Unfortunately, now, I can't in good conscience recommend KMLI. I can't tell you to go there without health insurance. Even morning Krav Maga classes were replaced with … yoga?  And then the entire schedule was rewritten twice.

Nothing personal to the folks of KMLI, I like most of you all quite a bit, but you have some instructors who should be fired, and better safety regulations.  Put Amy and Bill, and Dr. Blitz in more places in the schedule, and it would be a good start.

Krav Defense …. “Long Island's Leader in Krav Maga.” Um, ahem …

I did a review for Examiner.com on this fellow. You can read it here.

The short version: This guy is a joke. He is a bad joke. Told by a arthritic mime with Tourettes syndrome.

Have a good day.

Music blog: E Nomine, Doctor Who

I couldn't come up with a theme for this blog.  I was going through my iTunes list, and discovered that it basically looks like it was developed by someone with undiagnosed schizophrenia.

But, I try my best.

The song in this video is Mitternacht (Midnight). The song is by E Nomine, and the visuals are from a video game in the Resident Evil franchise.  You've seen another video with them before, with their far superior song Unser Vater.

Fighting and Writing, what is Krav Maga?

In one of my DragonCon reports, I noted that various authors have various reasons to have fight scenes in their novels: to honor those who have fought, to get realism in the writing, to come to grips with wars they've been in.

I'm not so high-minded.

There are some situations my characters won't be able to talk their way out of … in the case of A Pius Man, when there are people who start shooting up the Spanish Steps with a full-on assault with automatic weapons and RPGs, then there is only so much good harsh language can do for my protagonists.

The same goes with my theories on close-quarters combat. Unfortunately, most of my early fight scenes were developed by watching stuntmen dancing in various and sundry TV shows and movies. In fact, one of my characters, Sean A.P. Ryan, was a stuntman before going into the mercenary business—which is the only way that I could justify some of his crazier stunts.

Why not just use a real martial art?

Really? Which one? Tae Kwan Do, which has been referred to as a sport, even by black belts I've met? Karate, with kata dance routines that have about as much to do with an actual fight as ballet (I should know, I went for that when I was ten)?

I had come across penjakt silat, an Indonesian martial style, in Tom Clancy's NetForce novels; it was very practical, but overly complicated for writing purposes. MMA hadn't been popular when I started writing, and that, too, is merely a sport (high kicks are nice, but MMA doesn't have to deal with being kicked between the legs).

However, a few years ago, I was exposed to a system called Krav Maga. Not in standard media, but in a video game—Splinter Cell, to be exact. Yes, for you video game nerds, Sam Fisher is using an actual style of combat. They didn't just make it up as they went along

Later, I picked up novels based on the series 24, written by John Whitman. And, wow, it was practical.

And Krav Maga kept popping up in things I read. After a while, I took a hint, and I did some research into Krav Maga. I started by doing some research into John Whitman.

I discovered he was a black belt in Krav Maga. And he was more than an authority. He was apparently The authority in the United States.

For me, Krav Maga worked from a writing standpoint. It was simple, it was straightforward, and, most importantly, it used weapons. Not to mention that it was a style that was practical—a kick to the groin is a standard weapon, one that's practiced repeatedly; eye gouges are another tactic, one that I've never seen in a standard sparring match.

It was so much better for my writing, where all of my characters are … very practical. MMA is nice, and the fighters are all real athletes, but I don't recall the last MMA match that required having participants defend themselves against a knife, or one where someone is bleeding from bite marks.

I decided to look into Krav Maga a little.