Two down, one disregarded. Two up: we got ourselves a ballgame. And in case I don't say it enough, there are times when I am intensely glad that Mark is my best friend. That man knows his Transformers.

Merlin's pants, I hates me the telecom industry. HATES IT. (Yes: irony.) I was trucking along the Danforth on my bike this afternoon and my cell phone just wouldn't stop making noise. If it wasn't ringing, it was message-alerting. If it wasn't message-alerting, it was text-alerting. If it wasn't text-alerting, it was low-battery-alarming. I do not need to be this well informed. Nobody does. In the resulting furor I turned off every noise that the phone is capable of making - it is now on silent running, forever. The only way to get my attention now is for me to see the fucking thing light up blue. I'm okay with it.

Merlin's pants, I am also suddenly very fond of the expression "Merlin's pants."

Terry Moore is taking over Runaways, and Warren Ellis is taking over Astonishing X-Men. Which... is... okay... I... guess...???

Also straight out of comic con, a five minute preview of The Golden Compass. And it's official: I'm not on board. This thing just doesn't feel right. The animation on the daemons is way better than it was before, and the sets are pretty and everything, and Daniel Craig owns every kind of balls. But the girl doesn't work. And as the girl goes, so goes the nation. You can see her performing, see the tattered edges of Dakota Blue Richards trying to think her way through the blocking, the lines, the attitude, to pretend to be Lyra for the ten seconds that the camera is running and no longer. Sure, maybe I'm completely wrong and in the movie it will work perfectly. But in this rapid transit tour, it's a misfire.

And fuck me if the winter wind didn't blow straight through me when I heard him laugh.