David and Erin commiserate after the shared experience of boredom known as The Last Airbender. Listen to this podcast, but don’t see this movie.

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Let’s be honest: there really aren’t any geek holidays. The numerous interests of geeks worldwide have become so varied and diverse (some might say “fractured”), it’s hard to pinpoint even a couple of things that make someone definitively geeky or not. There’s geek-themed observances like Pi Day or Star Wars Day (May the 4th be with you), but there isn’t really a well-publicized overarching geek holiday out there. Which is fine.

Nevertheless, folks keep trying to foist these pseudo-geek-holidays on us. Today is such a day: “Embrace Your Geekness Day,” a made-up, pandering holiday copyrighted by the folks at Wellcat Holidays (whose website seems to be stuck in the late ’90s). From the site:

“Into dungeon games, comic books and doing vampire dress-up? Spend endless hours going strange places on the internet? You’re a geek, and this is the day to roar!”

Yeah.

Several websites, including CNN.com, are celebrating the holiday the way it seems meant to be — as an afterthought, with some minor coverage and mention of the holiday only on the day itself. Some geeky buzzwords are mentioned, and they talk about how a few Best Buy employees got to ring the opening bell at the NY Stock Exchange. Yippee.

Do geeks really need their own holiday? It would be cool, but not if it’s nothing more than an excuse to have an internet-wide thematic blog post topic once a year. The closest thing we have to a geek holiday is May 25th’s Geek Pride Day, which also happens to be Towel Day. While I understand this holiday began overseas in the late ’90s, in America it holds the same awareness factor as Arbor Day: something trivial that you might be made aware of on the day itself, but holding little or no value, and presenting little cause for celebration.

To me, it seems like the problem with these geek holidays is that they are not spurring forth from the geek community itself. They seem fabricated, observed only by media denizens eager to associate themselves with the current hip culture — geekdom. Perhaps someday there’ll be a true geek holiday, but until then, I’ll be more than happy to do what most geeks are doing today: ignoring this particular observance, and going along with our daily lives.

Listen along as the New York Geeks enter the world of D&D to play their very first game, along with guests Paul (Kevin Powerbottom), Mike (Bobert of the Light), and Dungeon Master Tom Witte!

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Show notes to come.

Adding to the lush foliage of this uncanny valley is the fact that Bina48 is partially made up of recorded data from a real person named Bina, one of the robot’s owners. Yikes. Check out the video below and see for yourself.

Interview With a Robot – Video Library – The New York Times

Personally, I think this is a bit insipid. The word geek is what it is, and just because geeks are no longer the objects of intense ridicule and social exclusion doesn’t mean we have to “change our branding” now, as if the geek community was some sort of corporate entity.

If anything, we should come up with a word to differentiate actual geeks from the wannabe poseur geeks, who appear to be more hipsters than anything. Anyway, take a listen and decide for yourself, and then let us know what you think!

On my way home from this year’s Brickworld event, I stopped at a random toy shop/museum and couldn’t help but purchase these figures, even though a) I don’t love Star Wars the way I used to, and b) it’s not 1995. Though, I suppose these two points are interrelated. Either way, awesome.

I finally replaced the R2-D2 that I’ve been “borrowing” from my younger brother since about 1998. Also, I always forget how ripped the original Luke and Han Solo from the ’90s were. I sense Rob Liefeld’s hand in this.

We also have Awesome Anakin Skywalker (none of that head-replacement BS), and Momaw Nadon, who I always liked.

If you’re a LOST fan, as I am, you’re probably kind of curious as to where this is all going. This weekend is the series finale of the show, and to celebrate, The Paley Center for Media is holding a little get-together:

“The Paley Center for Media and New York Comic Con are going to help EASE YOUR PAIN with a fun-filled celebration featuring a slew of events—a DHARMA aptitude test (aka trivia contest), a custom-made Lost game, prizes, giveaways, a panel discussion, and a special screening of a pop-up version of the program that got it all started: the pilot episode.”

The Last Lost Weekend: A Celebration | The Paley Center for Media