What to do with a $15 tax refund?

[dlgood]

Have not seen AtS yet. Have been busy writing article on the Littoral Combat Ship, and am just tired. Will get to that later.

Some random questions:

1. This year, I'm getting a $15 tax refund. How do you propose I allocate that?

2. Prior to Fred, what do you think the W&H body count was among the former AI crew. Are Lorne's outfits the product of Sweatshop Labor? Were any cute animals harmed in the fun testing done by the science department? What other documents had Gunn signed when not looking too closely, and what were the consequences? How's that guy who Wesley shot for no apparent reason doing?

They knew W&H was W&H when they signed on. How unrepresentative do y'all think the Illyria case is/was of what had been going on at W&H under the AI team's collective nose? Is there going to be an inquiry? Does anybody wanna run with those questions in a fic?

3. Is there a topic y'all want me to talk about, that you'll be likely diappointed because I won't actually get around to it?

Comments

[cleapet.livejournal.com]

You can explain the damn joke from "Underneath" to me because I'm still not getting it.

[dlgood.livejournal.com]

Haven't seen it yet. So I can't do it.

[ludditerobot.livejournal.com]

1. Music CD. That'll cover most but not all of a Miles Davis 70s jazz-funk live thing.

2. S5 Angel isn't compelling to me, dude. I'd rather send Riley into a Lovecraft-influence Baghdad, or somehow get Xander into a vamp-infested Minnesota alley.

3. What's the deal with you and PFD Panda?

[dlgood.livejournal.com]

3. It's this Mascot for the Coast Guard Auxiliary, which I came across while doing some research for the Integrated Deepwater Systems program. And I'm just too amused because it's so ludicrous.

Further, because one of my very good friends in grad school was "Goldie the Gopher" when he was in undergrad at the University of Minnesota. Mascots just amuse the hell out of me for no reason. They're just surreal.

[par-avion.livejournal.com]

1. Similarly, I was thinking iTunes. You could get 14 singles!

[sistakaren.livejournal.com]

How unrepresentative do y'all think the Illyria case is/was of what had been going on at W&H under the AI team's collective nose?

Ugh. Very. I really like Illyria, don't get me wrong. But I don't have any idea why they thought that was a good idea. It makes no sense. It pisses me off, because I thought they were doing a good job of doing the manipulation thing in a subtle way beforehand. But that? That was fucking lame. But I'm torn -- I do like Illyria, and I'm glad Fred's gone. Because things are more interesting now. But I can't get over that.

Even still -- I still kinda like this season. We'll see. Maybe it'll turn out like Buffy S5 -- a season that I kinda enjoyed at first, but ended up really disliking by the end.

[dlgood.livejournal.com]

That's why I really liked the scene with Angel and Gunn in the Hospital. Gunn's understanding that this was what was going at W&H. That the capabilities to do more good or be smarter or whatever they were getting, came with costs - human costs on the side. That it was Fred makes it hurt more, but it could have been someone else.

Wesley and Lorne's storylines seem so heavily bogged down in "Fred was so wonderful" that I think ME is missing its own point about what W&H was.

I'm kind of okay on the season so far. (Though Wesley is beginning to sound as pompous and irritating to me as he ever did.) I just want to know what Lindsey's motivation is because he doesn't make a lot of sense to me, based upon the way he left town in S2.

[sistakaren.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I agree. I think my thing with Illyria is that I don't understand her point. I mean, if Fred had just died, that'd be one thing. But why Illyria? Why do we need to have some old demon there? To be the physical manifestation of corruption? To have Fred's pure, beautiful, chaste visage be mutated into something horrible and ugly? Feh. That seems a little heavy handed.

But again, I'm torn. Because I really like Illyria. But I don't think she's necessary.

That, and I'm getting a little weirded out by all of Angel's proclamations that he thought he could do good at W&H. Did he? Did he really? Or was that just him putting on a face for Spike's sake in the last episode? Because seriously: I thought he did it for Connor, and for Connor only. I think he's trying to do what he can with the circumstances that he's in, but I didn't get the impression that he legitimately believed that he could do something good at W&H. But maybe that's just me?

[dlgood.livejournal.com]

I don't get the point of Illyria either. They need to have her do something before she turns into the Al Bundy of the demon world. "I was a God to Gods. I scored four touchdowns in one high school football game." Plus, Wesley lecturing and trying to be all incisive really grates on me.

As per that final paragraph - I pretty much concur. I find it hard to believe he ever really thought he could do much good at W&H - only stem the bleeding W&H would otherwise produce.