*Reblogged from penny-arcade.com

“ I don’t mean to turn PA into an episode of Kids say the darnedest things but some of you might appreciate this. I was playing Star Wars with my son the other night when he said something funny. Little Gabe is obsessed with Star Wars and so much of our play time involves reenacting the movies. On this particular occasion he was playing the role of the emperor while I was Luke Skywalker. He had seated himself in my computer chair and when he spun around to face me I saw that he had placed a toy Lightsaber on the arm rest. He patted it gently and said “You want this don’t you?” I could not help but laugh at how ridiculous the scene was. This bothered him and he told me not to laugh at him because he was the emperor and he was evil. “Yes I know.” I told him and tried to get my act together but his little angry eyes underneath the hood of his Mickey Mouse sweatshirt made me laugh even more. “I’m bad.” he said and as if to prove it told me “I litter!”

“What?” I asked “What do you mean you litter?” He pushed back his hood and looked at me seriously “Well littering is against the law and the Emperor does all bad things right?” I imagined the Emperor stalking the halls of the Deathstar and munching on a snickers bar. He finishes the last bite and throws the crumpled wrapper over his shoulder. An Imperial Guard bends to snatch it up and the Emperor raises a hand. “Leave it.” he croaks. The guard pauses, his red gloved hand shudders as it hovers over the bit of garbage lying there on the Deathstar’s polished Durasteel floor. The emperor watches the guard’s discomfort with growing satisfaction, a smile creasing his shriveled face. The Guard stands and follows the Emperor away and he can not help but spare a backwards glance at the trash he left behind. With the glance comes a thought, a thought he will never share out-loud but one that shakes him to his very core. “I serve a monster!”

I looked at my son and realized that in his five year old mind there is no gradient to evil. For him, the act of destroying Alderaan and littering are equal. The sort of person who could to one might easily do the other. I smiled at him “Of course he litters son. He litters all the time.” He smiled knowingly and I reached out with the force to summon my Lightsaber.

-Gabe out”

(via epiczach)

jawboneradio:

How can any self-respecting Star Wars loving male geek (or female geek, for that matter) not be in love with Bonnie Burton?

She loves Star Wars. Check.  She’s a big Star Wars crafter. Check. She works for the Lucas Empire. Check. She’s a blogger. Check. She writes books about drawing Star Wars. Check. All this plus she’s as cute as a button. Bonnie encompasses everything that a female geek should be and more.  She’s the kind of gal you admire from afar, knowing you’d have a good time if you got to hang out. 

But maybe that’s just wishful thinking on my part. 

I was introduced to Bonnie via her  Flickr photostream a few years ago. I was instantly captivated by her photos of the inner workings of being inside the belly of Lucas. It’s a wondrous cacophony of stormtroopers, ewoks, lightsabers and R2 units with a roundhouse kick of Daleks, sorcerers and Godzilla plush toys. Since then, I have admired Bonnie through her Twitter feed chock full of geeky morsels daily, enough to satisfy even the most discriminating sci-fi purist. She always manages to bring a smile to my face through her dozens of links.  If you’re a Star Wars fan and aren’t familiar with Bonnie, rectify this immediately, as you are missing a very important part of the extended Star Wars universe.

I was able to connect with Bonnie via e-mail and I’ll be sharing portions of her interview on the blog this week. (Sorry audio fans, no podcast!)  When it came time to design her card, I thought a Star Wars reference was a slam dunk.  But ironically, Bonnie seemed to be steering me away from Star Wars into a place totally different.  My original concept was to meld her interest in pinup star Bettie Page with Star Wars, but it was pretty apparent fairly quickly that Bonnie had no interest in going that direction. (Did you know Twi’leks are considered the strippers of the SW Universe?)  I was flipping through her photostream and came across a photo of her dressed as  Sean Young’s replicant character, Rachael, from Blade Runner.  I quickly did a pencil sketch of Bonnie as Replicant and Card #6 was born.

Incidentally, this is my favorite card so far in the series and I’ve been waiting to unveil it.  Hope everyone, including Bonnie, likes it.

The ever clever Retro Star Wars has revealed a fun little treat that will make you look that much geekier to your loved ones. Who doesn’t want to watch A New Hope in ASCII via the Terminal window? The instructions are below…

Mac

1. Fire up Terminal (it’s in your applications folder)
2. Type in “telnet towel.blinkenlights.nl” and press enter
3. Enjoy!

Windows:

1. Start > Programs > Accessories > Communications > HyperTerminal
2. Put in your area code, it’s annoying but do it
3. Type whatever name you want it to be when it pops up a window with a bunch of icons at the bottom
4. Type in “towel.blinkenlights.nl” (without quotes) in the Host address field, make sure the port number is 23 (that’s the number for telnet)
5. Click OK and watch it happen!

Linux:
Here’s the directions for Ubuntu (although it’s assumed Linux users would know how to do it already) - it’s basically the same as the directions for Mac, since it’s Unix-based.

1. Applications > Accessories > Terminal
2. Type in “telnet towel.blinkenlights.nl” without quotes and press enter
3. Ta-da!

Mac hint via the good doctor, Professor Curlybrain.

Windows and Linux direction from The Warped Passage.

(via retrostarwars)