Nerd News in Brief

As a member of the ever-growing legion of nerd parents, I found this item to be of particular interest.

The gist of it, for those of you who didn’t follow the link, is as follows: a new book entitled Sci-Fi Baby Names has 500 suggestions for ways to embarrass and alienate your child for years to come. It’s that simple.

Those of you in my age bracket probably remember growing up with a kid whose parents were diehard hippies and had favored her with some abysmal name like Rainbow. Well, the next generation may have to contend with a preschool class full of Sephiroths.

These aren’t hamsters you’re naming here, people; these are tiny human beings that you’re saddling with names unfathomable to folks who didn’t watch Babylon 5. Be creative, be geeky, but keep it within the bounds of reason. I’m just sayin’.

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And before anyone starts talking about stones and glass houses let me say that my son was not named after Nicholas Brendon’s character from Buffy the Vampire Slayer. That would’ve been silly. He was named after the lead singer of Cheap Trick.

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Don’t you fuckin’ judge me!

• Calling all street teams: Dan Lamoureux of Nerdcore For Life is presently looking for images of nerdcore gig flyers from the past year. If you’ve got a nerdy handbill you’d like to donate to the project, hit Dan up over at MySpace or via his Gmail (Shlomoism@).
• Fun and offensive… I’d call it Ofunsive: mCRT, the one-man hype machine behind Nerdapalooza SE, has just released his new album Bandwagon Jumper. It’s… um… profane. Really, it’s just nasty. Rob is my bro and all, but this one ain’t for the kids, the elderly, or those with weak constitutions. You’ve been warned. Those who like a good dick joke, however, are encouraged to play.
  
• Ginny is Punk Rocker: On the more family friendly end of things, The Whomping Willows recently announced plans for a new album due out sometime this fall. Whompy also dropped a few tentative track titles, which are actually pretty amusing on their own.
• The continuing saga: Everyone’s a winner at Nixon Peabody. Especially my pal Church. Hell, his [sarcasm] loving tribute [/sarcasm] to the world’s favorite self-congratulatory anthem even got him a little love from ABC. It’s all about the team.
• Snort, snort: Newsday is touting this new fall TV season as the proving ground for “the next wave of TV geeks.” No shit. It looks like NBC’s Chuck is their chief frame of reference, so I’m a little iffy. As much as the nerd-meets-secret-agent shtick appeals to me, I’m not sure I’m willing to bite yet. Time will tell.
• Nerd Ink TNG: Church has found yet another cache of nerdy tattoos. Damn… I'm starting to think this should become its own regular feature!
• Feel the power: To wrap up this belated edition of NNIB, here’s a clip of Powerglove performing "Storm Eagle" at the 16 Bit Genocide gamer festival. Church was nice enough to share his experience with those of us unable to attend, and once he described the band’s entrance – “they appeared onstage with foam-rubber Super Mario-esque accessories” – I knew I had missed something special.