George A. King III of the New York Post is reporting that the Yankees and Nick Johnson are close to a one-year deal.

Nicky was a Yankee farmhand, and he was my second-favorite Yankee when he was on the team (after Jorge Posada). An on-base machine -- Baseball Prospectus once referred to him as "OBP Jesus" -- he would be a perfect fit for the Yanks, who have a hole at DH with Hideki Matsui's departure for Anaheim.

I always hated the trade that sent Nicky, Juan Rivera, and Randy Choate to the Expos for Javier Vazquez after the 2003 season. Because they didn't win the World Series either year, the 2002 and 2003 teams don't get the credit they deserve, but those were two of the best teams of the Joe Torre era, and Nicky was a big part of both of them. And in 2004, when Jason Giambi went down with intestinal parasites for much of the season, forcing the Yanks to use the dessicated remains of Tony Clark and John Olerud at first, Nicky's absence was keenly felt -- and Vazquez was never all that in a Yankee uniform.

Putting his guaranteed .400-plus OBP between Derek Jeter and Mark Teixeira will make the top of the Yanks' order at least as much of a force to be reckoned with as it was with Johnny Damon in the #2 hole.

I really hope this deal happens.

I was in a local pizza place having lunch, and they were piping in the worst Christmas music ever. Well, maybe not the whole time, but while I was ordering, they were playing the most atrocious version of "The Twelve Days of Christmas" -- an already-hard-to-take song -- imaginable. Couldn't get my earbuds back in fast enough.....

Greg Eales of Project Fanboy gives Farscape #2 four stars out of five, while the Exile in Geeksville blog gives D'Argo's Quest #1 a B.

I have, in my hot little hands (well, not this second, as I'm typing this), two hot-off-the-presses copies of StarCraft: Ghost Academy Volume 1, a new manga from TokyoPop written by me with art by Fernando Heinz Furukawa.

I am well pleased.

The book will be available on 29 December. You can see a preview at TokyoPop's web site and watch this incredibly cool trailer:

( Trailer embedded behind the cut........... )

Roy E. Disney, the son of Roy O. Disney and nephew of Walt Disney, died yesterday at the age of 79 after a year-long battle with stomach cancer.

*raises glass*

The Iron Man 2 trailer is up.

Not that I wasn't there already, but I'm there.....

Edited to add: My buddy Joe Crowe reviews the trailer on Revolution SF.

You scullion! You rampallion! You fustilarian! I'll tickle your catastrophe!

--Sir John Falstaff, Henry IV Part Two, Act II, Scene I

The second issue of the ongoing Farscape series hit the stands today. This is Part 2 of "Tangled Roots," as Aeryn learns far more than bargained for on Prybella, and Crichton and Chiana try to get closer to Roiin.

Whadja think?

It's only a week before I leave for Christmas vacation, so of COURSE my car would choose this week to break down. It was on its last legs when I drove home last night, and I just barely managed to get to my apartment before it died completely. Which is as much of a stroke of luck as I was going to get. The nice lady from the BoE came over almost right away with her husband, and they tried to give me a boost, but my car was having none of it. I could have had it taken to the garage today for yet ANOTHER repair, but you know what? I'm sick of it. I've spent more repairing that damn car in the last two years than it was ever worth in the first place. So I asked my supervisor if he can help me find a new (well, used) car to buy instead.

It really, really sucks that I'd have to buy a car so soon after having to buy a new laptop. Assuming I can even find one that I can afford. And it's going to be a tremendous pain in the ass getting back and forth to work for the next few days, since none of my schools are near a train station, the bus routes in this town are crap, taxis are expensive, and it's going to be snowing every single day. Though considering how much my car was sliding around on the road when I was driving to work yesterday (and the fact that it's 12 years old and doesn't even have anti-lock brakes), a new car would probably go a long way towards me NOT DYING this winter. It's just a very shitty, inconvenient time for it to happen, and it's one of those frustrating situations where there's very little I can do besides sit around being useless and inconveniencing people.

I got a very awesome package in the mail from sabella_a, which I'll post about when I'm not stressed out over car troubles. There need to be pictures to do justice to its sheer awesomeness. Many, many, many pictures.

The first part of the Comic Con guest list came out today, and I already have my first thing to "OMG!!!" over: CHINA MIÉVILLE. Think I'll have time to re-read Un Lun Dun and Perdido Street Station before July rolls around?

Last night we had a record 18 people show up for fighting class. It was evenly split -- nine black belts, nine color belts. It went really well, and Shihan had us go 20 rounds. I came home totally poopied out.....

Have stuff to do in Manhattan today, and also need to work on the urban fantasy some more. Yesterday's work was mostly of the thoughtful variety, trying to figure out how to set scenes and such -- and also realizing that I wasn't sure if it should be first- or third-person. I'm going with first, but that means thinking more thoroughly about the main character's voice.

So wordage was only one paragraph, but a lot of work was done yesterday. Bloofle.

Where many podcasts take the holidays off, The Chronic Rift is actually stepping up production with the 12 Days of Riftmas. Starting -- well, two days ago, actually, there'll be a new podcast every day, each one produced by a different member of the Rift regulars:

( Here's the full list, including my contribution..... )

Episodes of the Rift, including all dozen of these, are available from iTunes, the Rift web site, and Mevio's Rift page. Please comment on the forums or leave a message at 888-866-9010.