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newnumber6Yep, here we go again. Guess I had a lot to say these last few days...
First, just got back from the Taste of the Danforth, where I had Gyros. I had to include that, because gyros do not go without comment. Mmmmmmmm, gyros. Actually, I had more than that. I had _2_ gyros, some zelnic (cheese pie. Well, technically I think it can refer to either the cheese or onion or spinach pie, but I had the cheese cause I don't like the other two), and some Loukamades (honey balls). Mmmm. Although I do have one bone to pick with the second gyro. The greeks encourage attempts to innovate, but the gyro is a delicate balance, and lettuce does not belong in the balance. It throws off the flavour medly, and turns something from 'awesome meal' to 'tasty but could be better'.
Next topic! Relativity, Time Dilation, and Communications Across The Gulf of Stars
One of the things most space-based television science fiction bypasses are the known laws of space travel. According to Relativity, you can't go faster than the speed of light (well, technically speaking, you can't _accelerate_ faster than the speed of light. It's still possible for there to be objects or particles that travel faster). Moreover, as you approach the speed of light, there's a time dilation effect - time on board the starship moves much slower compared to, say, time of an observer on Earth. What might only be a few months on the ship could translate to a year, or even hundreds or thousands of years, depending on how close to the speed of light the travel is.
I find the notion of relativistic flight extremely appealing for some reason. I suppose because it combines the two dreams of travelling to another world and travelling into the future. And there's something sort of bleakly romantic in it, too. Soaring into time on a one way trip while whole civilizations could die (or in the case of Tau Zero, a whole universe). One way because, even if you return, so much time has passed it might as well be a completely new place, everyone you know might well have died, so you'd be forcibly cut off from everything you ever knew (even if you somehow got messages during your flight)... everyone except those you travel with, which is part of the romance, I suppose. The same sort of romance of two (or more) people sharing an apocalypse (which is why I said 'bleak').
Even the idea of getting mail is sort of appealing. Imagine getting a mail every hour, a letter that takes up to a year of real time of somebody, or even just a year of general news. I've actually thought a bit about experimenting with journal-based fiction and trying something like that... setting up a journal which is basically letters written to someone on a relativistic voyage, where the readers are put in the perspective of the person on the ship, and they receive a message in this case, say, every week, that covers a year of real time. Of course, by its nature it'd be of limited duration (unless you extended it with generations of the same family or something), almost more performance art (because the time between messages is real for the audience). Of course it's an ambitious undertaking, so I probably won't wind up doing it. I've already got my![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
alternaljournal, that's good enough for experimental journal fiction for now. Probably. But y'never know, I'm still thinking about it from time to time.
Anyway, I see nothing wrong with bypassing known laws of physics for SF in general. But I've always wanted to see a good space-based TV show that took relativity into account. Written fiction has scads of examples of it. It's used in the Ender series which is probably why it's on my mind now. And of course there's "The Forever War" and its treatment of soldiers fighting an interstellar war and becoming more and more alienated from Earth because for every battle they fight, years pass back home. But I want to see it used on an ongoing TV show.
Once I had an idea I wanted to make into a TV series of my own, except for the fact that I was in no position to ever do so. The idea was sorta BSG-like (although it was years before the new one that I came up with it), in that it focused on humanity fleeing after their planet was conquered - although in this case it was aliens. The idea was that an alien ship had appeared in orbit. Information on it suggested that an alien armada was on its way ready to conquer Earth, and that Earth was to use the ship as an arc to save a small fraction of humanity and find somewhere else. (They would, in the second episode after everyone leaves, discover that the underside of the ship, which they assumed was inaccessable because it contained what generated artificial gravity, was actually a second 'ark' for a much more primitive alien race that was about to be conquered, and they had to share it). Their providers were left unknown, but the technology level of the ship was greater than anything else any of the other aliens they'd encounter had, and so lots of people would want them once they found it out (the ship would also have no weaponry).
Anyway, the ship travelled relativistically (it dodged outside into another dimension for easier acceleration and such, and more importantly to make the ship hard to track, but it still included time dilation). The invaders usually travelled by a Jumpgate style wormhole, which had to be shipped through normal space, under the lightspeed limit, to any world anyone wanted to open up contact with, but once a connection was established, travel time between gates was instant. So generally the idea was that the heroes would fly relativistically and occasionally interact with the greater, but continually evolving, galactic community. They could stop by a world, then fly somewhere else and return and see it hundreds of years later, perhaps changed for the worse from their original contact. They could try and set up a colony, leave it, and the next episode they return to see how it's doing. They could lose a key member of their crew due to having to leave suddenly in the season finale, but the trip is so close and connected by jumpgates that he meets them at their next stop, 5 years later for him and only a few days or weeks for them. The aliens that conquered Earth could go through phases of being insanely conquering, being relatively peaceful, or even being conquered themselves by yet another force. In my head, it was a really cool series idea, but I don't suppose I'll ever be able to make it work or I'd not post it here.
(I had all the technobabble details for various things like how gravity was generated, and how you'd leave the ship to get to the planet, but I'll leave them out in case I want to use them again)
I think in my prose writing I'll also try to use relativity where possible, cause it's cool.
Moving on back to the initial topic, it's these kinds of potential stories that make me long for time dilation in SF. Now, on the other hand, for communications between separated worlds, I tend to like the ansible, like used in the Ender books (of course, Ursula K. LeGuin coined the term in her books). Instant communication, even though travel time obeyed the lightspeed limit (I always kinda wanted Firefly to have FTL, but very SLOW FTL, around a few star systems near to each other, but ansible-style communications... This might be the one time I was disappointed to find out that there's no faster than light travel in a SF series, because to me it doesn't make sense for FF to take place all in a single star system).
But I love the idea of people on other planets able to converse freely, without time lag, and interact much like an internet (but with video, probably). Maybe it's my own internet bound life that makes it desireable, sort of like a planetary internet, able to sample any world or alien culture but at a safe distance without having to go through the trouble of travel. But more the idea that many different minds, many different types of minds, could be brought to bear on any problem.
(Although I should note that I really loved it when shows like Stargate include time lag in radio communications in their plot. Particularly the one where Jack and Teal'c were shot out into space in a Death Glider. They don't do it much anymore now that they have subspace communicators, but it was pure pleasure to see them do it when they did)
So in short, my choice for SF: Relativity, but instant communication by ansible!
Meme stolen fromanomilygrace... 10 random questions
1. What is your main cell phone ring-tone?
I don't have one. However, if I did have one, it'd be the sound of the TARDIS appearing in Doctor Who. Because then, every time I get a call, a small part of me would be like, 'OMG THE TARDIS IS HERE!'. Plus, it'd instantly identify any other Doctor Who fans in the immediate area.
2. What is your default LJ icon?
It's my ghostly icon, the first icon I ever made. It's basically a ghostly figure in Central Park, meant to represent one of my favorite online RPG characters (who had the superpower of leaving his body to travel around in a 'ghost form').
3. What station is your car radio permanently tuned to?
I have neither a car, nor do I listen to a radio. However, if I did have a car I'd probably tune it either to an all news station or some kind of talk radio, I suppose.
4. What is your computer desktop image?
My main computer has Serenity flying over a planet (far over, so you can see the curvature of it and above the clouds).
My other computer has a default 'tropical island' desktop because I haven't found anything that inspires me to change it yet.
5. Is there something you wear every single day?
Clothes. No one item of clothing every day (I mean, I wear jeans and t-shirts every single day, but not the same pair of jeans or the same shirt, obviously).
6. I wish I had a tracking device on:
My space ship. Cause that'd mean I had a spaceship.
7. What page does your internet browser open with?
Livejournal. I'm lazy.
8. This item never leaves my car/purse:
I don't have a car or a purse, so I can't answer. I can't even offer an alternative container that I might be able to answer for.
Okay, what the hell. I have a wallet, and in that wallet I have a folded up American $1 that never leaves it. It's not for luck or any particular sentimental reason. It's just too pointless for me to try and spend or convert an American $1 bill.
9. What TV show do you never miss?
Well, I pretty much never miss all the shows I care about, cause, a) I have no life to speak of, and b) even if I had other plans, it's so easy to tape and/or download.
10. What phrase do you hear yourself repeating too often?
I don't find myself repeating any particular phrase aloud, as I talk very rarely. Unless 'Uh-huh' counts as a phrase.
I will, from time to time, shout "Don't do it, it's a trap!" online, whether it's appropriate or not (well, it's always appropriate)
In my head I often have a phrase bopping around in my head repeatedly... sometimes music, sometimes not. At the time of this writing though, I don't.
Some thoughts on recent terrorism plots and the reaction to it (cut and pasted from a forum thread where I also posted it):
I remember a line, I think it was in Babylon 5, something along the lines of "no amount of preparations can guarantee against one man willing to sacrifice his life for the target." So I sort of view excessive security measures as a little pointless. At _best_, all it will do is eventually shift the focus of terrorists. Like how if you make an unbreakable car lock, all it will do is shift the focus of thieves into attacking the owners and getting the car keys, which might actually be _more_ dangerous to the owners than their car getting stolen.
I mean, if I were a terrorist planning on sacrificing myself, I wouldn't worry that someone might inspect my bag. I'd go for the target, and the moment someone tried to inspect my bag, well, looks like I have a new target - anyone nearby at that moment. It'll still create a hell of a lot of terror... especially if somebody ELSE willing to sacrifice his life is in place to take advantage of a panicked evacuation. It'll still get news. It'll still make people afraid. It'll still get my point across. It'll make travel difficult for everyone (bag inspections and strip searches for everyone, outside the airport from now on! Form a line in the parking lot!) So what if, instead of happening in a plane, it happens in a crowded airport? And if they make airports impregnable, is it really that big a deal for a determined terrorist, if you can't blow up an airplane, when you can go into other crowded buildings and blow them up to make your point?
Hell, even _capturing_ a load of terrorists _before_ the attack seems to work to the terrorists goal, to induce terror. After the recent plane plot, I heard someone suggest that people will eventually come to accept only boarding a plane with their travel documents, and nothing else. I half wonder if there's the occasional 'moral terrorist' who doesn't actually want to kill people, but wants to make people afraid anyway and thinking about their cause, and he so plots out a big attack and then intentionally gets himself captured before it can be put into action.
To me, the appropriate response to terrorism isn't to bend yourself backwards to prevent even the possibility of terrorism, because the only way to do that is a Big-Brother-esque society with chips in everyone's heads, and maybe not even then. It's to take whatever precautions you can that don't sacrifice your way of life, and then you assume the risk for whatever else.
There was a boingboing post recently on 'only traitors try to make us afraid of terrorists' about a study which shows that even in Israel, you're four times more likely to die in a car accident than terrorism, and in the US you're more likely to be struck by lightning. If we tried to safeguard against car accidents the same way we do terrorism... well, gas prices would be a hell of a lot lower because almost nobody would be on the road.
Sorry, rant over.
Dream Foo. Short one. Involves someone on the flist!
I know there was much more to it, but all I can remember is that I somehow metlyssachan and went to her house. I knew this because there were pictures of me there. Except... for the life of me I couldn't remember going there, and I was wracking my brain trying to figure out how I could have gone there without remembering even leaving the city. That's about it. Not very entertaining sorry. And I'm sorry I got you to peek under the cut only because you were wondering if you were the person on the flist I dreamed about (you know you did)! ;)
Thoughts on Stargate SG1 and Atlantis, episode 5 of current season. Some spoilers.
SG1 started a little weakly, with Cal and Landry's interactions feeling a little forced and the big alien monster plot being uninteresting. It did pick up a little when I realized they were using elements from a forgettable season 6 episode "Sight Unseen"... it's one of the reasons I love Stargate, you know that the writers have to be rewatching the old episodes regularly and thinking, "You know, I could write a cool episode springing off from this idea, combined with this idea, and this idea, too." In this case it was only an average episode, but still, I applaud the effort. Did the monster remind anyone else of one of the creatures from DOOM? The original game, I mean. The one that coincidentally had an invisible version of it too.
Next up, episode 200!
As for Atlantis, this time it was a little better than SG1, mostly because it was a little plottier (yes, that's the word I was looking for). I caught onto the VR thing pretty quickly. I am a little concerned about using these as the next big bad, because they risk making a villain too powerful to be defeated without really dumb plot logic. SG1 managed to walk a fine line with it, but then did the sensible thing and got rid of them seemingly for good. Oh well, we'll see how Atlantis handles them, and explains the connection, if any (but there should be) with the ones in the Asgard galaxy (and I want an onscreen reaction from the Asgard on the Daedalus, tout suite!). Some nice Rodney/Shepherd snarkiness in this too.
First, just got back from the Taste of the Danforth, where I had Gyros. I had to include that, because gyros do not go without comment. Mmmmmmmm, gyros. Actually, I had more than that. I had _2_ gyros, some zelnic (cheese pie. Well, technically I think it can refer to either the cheese or onion or spinach pie, but I had the cheese cause I don't like the other two), and some Loukamades (honey balls). Mmmm. Although I do have one bone to pick with the second gyro. The greeks encourage attempts to innovate, but the gyro is a delicate balance, and lettuce does not belong in the balance. It throws off the flavour medly, and turns something from 'awesome meal' to 'tasty but could be better'.
Next topic! Relativity, Time Dilation, and Communications Across The Gulf of Stars
One of the things most space-based television science fiction bypasses are the known laws of space travel. According to Relativity, you can't go faster than the speed of light (well, technically speaking, you can't _accelerate_ faster than the speed of light. It's still possible for there to be objects or particles that travel faster). Moreover, as you approach the speed of light, there's a time dilation effect - time on board the starship moves much slower compared to, say, time of an observer on Earth. What might only be a few months on the ship could translate to a year, or even hundreds or thousands of years, depending on how close to the speed of light the travel is.
I find the notion of relativistic flight extremely appealing for some reason. I suppose because it combines the two dreams of travelling to another world and travelling into the future. And there's something sort of bleakly romantic in it, too. Soaring into time on a one way trip while whole civilizations could die (or in the case of Tau Zero, a whole universe). One way because, even if you return, so much time has passed it might as well be a completely new place, everyone you know might well have died, so you'd be forcibly cut off from everything you ever knew (even if you somehow got messages during your flight)... everyone except those you travel with, which is part of the romance, I suppose. The same sort of romance of two (or more) people sharing an apocalypse (which is why I said 'bleak').
Even the idea of getting mail is sort of appealing. Imagine getting a mail every hour, a letter that takes up to a year of real time of somebody, or even just a year of general news. I've actually thought a bit about experimenting with journal-based fiction and trying something like that... setting up a journal which is basically letters written to someone on a relativistic voyage, where the readers are put in the perspective of the person on the ship, and they receive a message in this case, say, every week, that covers a year of real time. Of course, by its nature it'd be of limited duration (unless you extended it with generations of the same family or something), almost more performance art (because the time between messages is real for the audience). Of course it's an ambitious undertaking, so I probably won't wind up doing it. I've already got my
alternaljournal, that's good enough for experimental journal fiction for now. Probably. But y'never know, I'm still thinking about it from time to time.Anyway, I see nothing wrong with bypassing known laws of physics for SF in general. But I've always wanted to see a good space-based TV show that took relativity into account. Written fiction has scads of examples of it. It's used in the Ender series which is probably why it's on my mind now. And of course there's "The Forever War" and its treatment of soldiers fighting an interstellar war and becoming more and more alienated from Earth because for every battle they fight, years pass back home. But I want to see it used on an ongoing TV show.
Once I had an idea I wanted to make into a TV series of my own, except for the fact that I was in no position to ever do so. The idea was sorta BSG-like (although it was years before the new one that I came up with it), in that it focused on humanity fleeing after their planet was conquered - although in this case it was aliens. The idea was that an alien ship had appeared in orbit. Information on it suggested that an alien armada was on its way ready to conquer Earth, and that Earth was to use the ship as an arc to save a small fraction of humanity and find somewhere else. (They would, in the second episode after everyone leaves, discover that the underside of the ship, which they assumed was inaccessable because it contained what generated artificial gravity, was actually a second 'ark' for a much more primitive alien race that was about to be conquered, and they had to share it). Their providers were left unknown, but the technology level of the ship was greater than anything else any of the other aliens they'd encounter had, and so lots of people would want them once they found it out (the ship would also have no weaponry).
Anyway, the ship travelled relativistically (it dodged outside into another dimension for easier acceleration and such, and more importantly to make the ship hard to track, but it still included time dilation). The invaders usually travelled by a Jumpgate style wormhole, which had to be shipped through normal space, under the lightspeed limit, to any world anyone wanted to open up contact with, but once a connection was established, travel time between gates was instant. So generally the idea was that the heroes would fly relativistically and occasionally interact with the greater, but continually evolving, galactic community. They could stop by a world, then fly somewhere else and return and see it hundreds of years later, perhaps changed for the worse from their original contact. They could try and set up a colony, leave it, and the next episode they return to see how it's doing. They could lose a key member of their crew due to having to leave suddenly in the season finale, but the trip is so close and connected by jumpgates that he meets them at their next stop, 5 years later for him and only a few days or weeks for them. The aliens that conquered Earth could go through phases of being insanely conquering, being relatively peaceful, or even being conquered themselves by yet another force. In my head, it was a really cool series idea, but I don't suppose I'll ever be able to make it work or I'd not post it here.
(I had all the technobabble details for various things like how gravity was generated, and how you'd leave the ship to get to the planet, but I'll leave them out in case I want to use them again)
I think in my prose writing I'll also try to use relativity where possible, cause it's cool.
Moving on back to the initial topic, it's these kinds of potential stories that make me long for time dilation in SF. Now, on the other hand, for communications between separated worlds, I tend to like the ansible, like used in the Ender books (of course, Ursula K. LeGuin coined the term in her books). Instant communication, even though travel time obeyed the lightspeed limit (I always kinda wanted Firefly to have FTL, but very SLOW FTL, around a few star systems near to each other, but ansible-style communications... This might be the one time I was disappointed to find out that there's no faster than light travel in a SF series, because to me it doesn't make sense for FF to take place all in a single star system).
But I love the idea of people on other planets able to converse freely, without time lag, and interact much like an internet (but with video, probably). Maybe it's my own internet bound life that makes it desireable, sort of like a planetary internet, able to sample any world or alien culture but at a safe distance without having to go through the trouble of travel. But more the idea that many different minds, many different types of minds, could be brought to bear on any problem.
(Although I should note that I really loved it when shows like Stargate include time lag in radio communications in their plot. Particularly the one where Jack and Teal'c were shot out into space in a Death Glider. They don't do it much anymore now that they have subspace communicators, but it was pure pleasure to see them do it when they did)
So in short, my choice for SF: Relativity, but instant communication by ansible!
Meme stolen from
anomilygrace... 10 random questions1. What is your main cell phone ring-tone?
I don't have one. However, if I did have one, it'd be the sound of the TARDIS appearing in Doctor Who. Because then, every time I get a call, a small part of me would be like, 'OMG THE TARDIS IS HERE!'. Plus, it'd instantly identify any other Doctor Who fans in the immediate area.
2. What is your default LJ icon?
It's my ghostly icon, the first icon I ever made. It's basically a ghostly figure in Central Park, meant to represent one of my favorite online RPG characters (who had the superpower of leaving his body to travel around in a 'ghost form').
3. What station is your car radio permanently tuned to?
I have neither a car, nor do I listen to a radio. However, if I did have a car I'd probably tune it either to an all news station or some kind of talk radio, I suppose.
4. What is your computer desktop image?
My main computer has Serenity flying over a planet (far over, so you can see the curvature of it and above the clouds).
My other computer has a default 'tropical island' desktop because I haven't found anything that inspires me to change it yet.
5. Is there something you wear every single day?
Clothes. No one item of clothing every day (I mean, I wear jeans and t-shirts every single day, but not the same pair of jeans or the same shirt, obviously).
6. I wish I had a tracking device on:
My space ship. Cause that'd mean I had a spaceship.
7. What page does your internet browser open with?
Livejournal. I'm lazy.
8. This item never leaves my car/purse:
I don't have a car or a purse, so I can't answer. I can't even offer an alternative container that I might be able to answer for.
Okay, what the hell. I have a wallet, and in that wallet I have a folded up American $1 that never leaves it. It's not for luck or any particular sentimental reason. It's just too pointless for me to try and spend or convert an American $1 bill.
9. What TV show do you never miss?
Well, I pretty much never miss all the shows I care about, cause, a) I have no life to speak of, and b) even if I had other plans, it's so easy to tape and/or download.
10. What phrase do you hear yourself repeating too often?
I don't find myself repeating any particular phrase aloud, as I talk very rarely. Unless 'Uh-huh' counts as a phrase.
I will, from time to time, shout "Don't do it, it's a trap!" online, whether it's appropriate or not (well, it's always appropriate)
In my head I often have a phrase bopping around in my head repeatedly... sometimes music, sometimes not. At the time of this writing though, I don't.
Some thoughts on recent terrorism plots and the reaction to it (cut and pasted from a forum thread where I also posted it):
I remember a line, I think it was in Babylon 5, something along the lines of "no amount of preparations can guarantee against one man willing to sacrifice his life for the target." So I sort of view excessive security measures as a little pointless. At _best_, all it will do is eventually shift the focus of terrorists. Like how if you make an unbreakable car lock, all it will do is shift the focus of thieves into attacking the owners and getting the car keys, which might actually be _more_ dangerous to the owners than their car getting stolen.
I mean, if I were a terrorist planning on sacrificing myself, I wouldn't worry that someone might inspect my bag. I'd go for the target, and the moment someone tried to inspect my bag, well, looks like I have a new target - anyone nearby at that moment. It'll still create a hell of a lot of terror... especially if somebody ELSE willing to sacrifice his life is in place to take advantage of a panicked evacuation. It'll still get news. It'll still make people afraid. It'll still get my point across. It'll make travel difficult for everyone (bag inspections and strip searches for everyone, outside the airport from now on! Form a line in the parking lot!) So what if, instead of happening in a plane, it happens in a crowded airport? And if they make airports impregnable, is it really that big a deal for a determined terrorist, if you can't blow up an airplane, when you can go into other crowded buildings and blow them up to make your point?
Hell, even _capturing_ a load of terrorists _before_ the attack seems to work to the terrorists goal, to induce terror. After the recent plane plot, I heard someone suggest that people will eventually come to accept only boarding a plane with their travel documents, and nothing else. I half wonder if there's the occasional 'moral terrorist' who doesn't actually want to kill people, but wants to make people afraid anyway and thinking about their cause, and he so plots out a big attack and then intentionally gets himself captured before it can be put into action.
To me, the appropriate response to terrorism isn't to bend yourself backwards to prevent even the possibility of terrorism, because the only way to do that is a Big-Brother-esque society with chips in everyone's heads, and maybe not even then. It's to take whatever precautions you can that don't sacrifice your way of life, and then you assume the risk for whatever else.
There was a boingboing post recently on 'only traitors try to make us afraid of terrorists' about a study which shows that even in Israel, you're four times more likely to die in a car accident than terrorism, and in the US you're more likely to be struck by lightning. If we tried to safeguard against car accidents the same way we do terrorism... well, gas prices would be a hell of a lot lower because almost nobody would be on the road.
Sorry, rant over.
Dream Foo. Short one. Involves someone on the flist!
I know there was much more to it, but all I can remember is that I somehow met
lyssachan and went to her house. I knew this because there were pictures of me there. Except... for the life of me I couldn't remember going there, and I was wracking my brain trying to figure out how I could have gone there without remembering even leaving the city. That's about it. Not very entertaining sorry. And I'm sorry I got you to peek under the cut only because you were wondering if you were the person on the flist I dreamed about (you know you did)! ;)Thoughts on Stargate SG1 and Atlantis, episode 5 of current season. Some spoilers.
SG1 started a little weakly, with Cal and Landry's interactions feeling a little forced and the big alien monster plot being uninteresting. It did pick up a little when I realized they were using elements from a forgettable season 6 episode "Sight Unseen"... it's one of the reasons I love Stargate, you know that the writers have to be rewatching the old episodes regularly and thinking, "You know, I could write a cool episode springing off from this idea, combined with this idea, and this idea, too." In this case it was only an average episode, but still, I applaud the effort. Did the monster remind anyone else of one of the creatures from DOOM? The original game, I mean. The one that coincidentally had an invisible version of it too.
Next up, episode 200!
As for Atlantis, this time it was a little better than SG1, mostly because it was a little plottier (yes, that's the word I was looking for). I caught onto the VR thing pretty quickly. I am a little concerned about using these as the next big bad, because they risk making a villain too powerful to be defeated without really dumb plot logic. SG1 managed to walk a fine line with it, but then did the sensible thing and got rid of them seemingly for good. Oh well, we'll see how Atlantis handles them, and explains the connection, if any (but there should be) with the ones in the Asgard galaxy (and I want an onscreen reaction from the Asgard on the Daedalus, tout suite!). Some nice Rodney/Shepherd snarkiness in this too.
