October 25, 2007
Comics by Shintaro Kago
Abstraction by Shintaro Kago is distilled surrealism, a fourth wall-smashing comic that amazes at every turn. (NSFW) [more inside]
Freely-available textbooks
The Soapbox.
The Soapbox is a collection of photographs, texts of speeches, transcripts of debates and political ads from Australian election campaigns (both State and Federal) from 1901 to the present day. More materials will be added when they become available.
Modern Plastic Surgery
Be a Music Faun Yourself. A sign of the popularity of this operation is that in big cities so-called Faun-Clubs are founded one after another, where entrance is only allowed with pointed ears. The reverberating success of this new look is supported by more and more celebrities with pointed ears, amongst whom we can find not only musicians, but, for example, models, as well. via
CalSky map to find Comet Holmes/17P
Here's an excellent map if you want to see Comet Holmes/17P tonight (the comet that, until a couple of nights ago you would have needed a pretty good-sized telescope to even see. Then (out of the blue, as it were) it unexpectedly brightened by over 1,000,000 times to become an easy object for your naked eye –even with the nearly full moon in the sky). I did not know about CalSky but (despite some less-than-attractive web design) is truly the best of the web for online astronomy info and sky maps! [more inside]
Hot Pants Homo
Gay Pulp. Enjoy Queens in Drag. Thrill at The Killer Queens. Puzzle about The Flesh Mast in this fascinating (and mildly NSFW) photoset from one Miss Magnolia Thunderpussy.
The (smart) rats have left the ship
In the wake of Rupert Murdoch's takeover of the Wall Street Journal, several of the paper's top reporters have left for safer ground. Among them is Tara Parker-Pope, who joined the New York Times on October 3rd. Her blog, Well, currently accounts for three of the paper's top ten e-mailed stories: in addition to number 1, Five Easy Ways to Go Organic, she has number 5, Shhh...My Child Is Sleeping (in My Bed, Um, With Me), and number 8, Drug-Resistant Staph: What You Need to Know. Touché Rupert.
Equine nasal strips
Nasal strips for horses. I thought it was a parody when I saw it on Cardhouse, but no, they exist. Now your steed can nicker and snort as if with nostrils of Teflon.
Waltz for Debby.
Sad, head-down legendary jazz piano. (Single-link YouTube)
More Bill and the Wiki. [Previously]
Hopefully more of a reminder than a double.
Ask MetaFilter is now obsolete!
zuni food
James Beard Chef of the Year (2004) Judy Rodgers espouses the benefits of salting early. She is the chef-owner of the Zuni Cafe in San Francisco, and the author of the incredible Zuni Cafe Cookbook. Her Roast Chicken with Bread Salad is a revelation, and really not that hard to do at home.
Fly your freak flag.
We Are Multicolored. Remix the flags of the world.
Vibrations make the world
String Theory in two minutes or less, or if the Reader's Digest Condensed version of string theory is too terse, spend an hour with Dr. Michio Kaku and Brian Greene. (previously) (via /. and WBAI)
Coptic Book Art
Daniel Essig creates wooden-covered art books and book-based sculptures. "Using a fourth-century binding style known as Ethiopian style Coptic, he creates mixed-media book structures that incorporate unusual woods, handmade paper, found objects, fossils, and mica. He lives in Asheville, North Carolina, where he has a studio at the Grovewood Gallery." [Via MonkeyFilter, which has links to other book artists.]
Manifold Menus
Manufold Menus [4.4MB PDF - mirror]: Cooking on train motors, including recipes, cooking vessels (really, plastic bags and Gladware) pictures of where to stash the food, and resulting dishes.
The total value of all your mines, mills, money bins, and so fourth is one multiplujillion, nine obsquatumatillion, six hundred and twenty-three dollars and sixty-two cents!
A miniature of Scrooge McDuck's money bin. (in the words of the model maker) This is a set of images documenting a model of the world's richest duck's money bin, built by me, using blueprints created by the great Don Rosa and Dan Shane.And remember Carl Barks - the mind behind the idea of a man storing all his money in a giant concrete bin.
evolutionary lit crit
Mister Rogers talks about games
Mister Rogers asks a kid how to play Donkey Kong. Later in the clip, Keith David shows up and demonstrates how the buttons in an arcade machine work. [Via.]
What did the Potato say to the Onion…
Potato and Onion are the stars of their very own Web Comic! It started with an off-color quasi joke and
never let up. They Dressed Up
Wore Disguises,
Got a hip new look and even
fought zombies…
With Zombies!
Asian Traditional Archery
The Asian Traditional Archery Network! Atrocious, frame-y site design hides oddles of cool articles about: The Chinese repeating crossbow, archives from Instinctive Archer magazine, the Buryat bow of Mongolia, and why shooting nurtures the mind's eye. Perhaps the best indication of the depth and breadth of the site can be seen on this page of excerpts from the ATARN newsletter. There's also a small picture archive, but there are a lot of other pictures and illustrations scattered over the site.
Come on now! This is America. Time is money!
RC Model Crashes [youtube] B-52, P-51, RC Model crash filmed with an on-board camera, Monoplane crash, Thunderbolt crash, Dogfight and mid-air collision
It's entirely possible her cunning plans are still underway...
He owned a chain of hair salons. She was a computer science student at University of Leicester. Together, they stared at many a kid from the games section of their local toy store, challenging them to try a grown-up game. Now you can find out what happened to the couple on the Mastermind box. (Via.)
Scientists are getting a bit nervous.
In what it calls "the final wake-up call to the international community," a UN report (press release, website, 21 MB PDF) warns that damage to the environment is reaching a "point of no return" and now threatens "humanity's very survival." Oh, c'mon, tell us what you really think.
extreme survivors
The world’s toughest animal. Tardigrades, are sometimes called water bears [embedded video] or moss piglets. They are the coolest things on 6 to 8 legs and are able to survive in extreme environments that would kill almost any other animal. Freeze them, boil them, dry them, expose them to open space & radiation - after 200 years they'll still be alive! And some have just come back from a a rocket trip. [more inside]
Chris Chester, B and The Providence of a Sparrow
'There’s a special providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now, 't is not to come; if it be not to come, it will be now; if it be not now, yet it will come: the readiness is all. Since no man has aught of what he leaves, what is 't to leave betimes?'Chris Chester, author of Providence of a Sparrow: Lessons from a Life Gone to the Birds, a meditation on his life with B, an English Sparrow which he raised from a hatchling fallen from the nest, died suddenly early this past Spring. His nephew Marc Mowery has created Chris Chester - born May 14, 1952 died April 17, 2007 to his memory and has posted 6 of 8 short videos of Chris and Rebecca Chester and the sparrow named B on YouTube.
And here is The Sorrow and the Sparrow: The Life and Death of Chris Chester
Excerpt and video links within [more inside]
Yo Adrian!
If you like boxing (or "Rocky") you might enjoy this youtube video of the Arturo Gatti - Mickey Ward fights recut to resemble Rocky II. [more inside]
Turnabout is fair play.
Ladies and Gentleman, introducing Chiasmodon niger, the Great Swallower!
No, not that one. (NSFW) This is ... The Great Swallower!! Step right up ladies and gentlemen!
Yes, sonny, I know this has been posted on the internets before, g'wan home, kid, y'bother me... Step right up! The Great Swallower, Ladies and Gentlemen!
Farecast top cities Christmas index
An interesting post detailing how airline prices for the holidays have been going up faster than last year.
Naomi Klein approves of none of these
Five Easy Ways to Go Organic
Bomb Bomb Bomb, Bomb Bomb Iran
The Secret History of the Impending War with Iran That the White House Doesn't Want You to Know [print version] profiles former NSC Middle East policy experts Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann and how the Bush administration turned down a March 2003 peace offer from Iran. [more inside]
Who would you slap?
Who would you slap? (audio NSFW) Osama? Bush? Still want to slap Blair? Maybe Paris? Jerry? Maggie? [Thanks urban75 editor!]
Growing up and living with Crohn's disease
Political courage
Today is the fifth anniversary of Senator Paul Wellstone's death. Wellstone's friend and Senate colleague Mark Dayton writes in today's St. Paul Pioneer Press that Wellstone's vocal opposition to the Iraq War in the days leading up to his death in an airplane crash offers an example of rare political courage.
To Read or Not to Read
MindPapers - David Chalmers organizes, streamlines and expands his collection of papers related to mind and neuroscience.
Facebook to blue screen shortly
Microsoft buys stake in Facebook. Microsoft has paid $240m (£117m) for a 1.6% stake in Facebook that values the hugely popular social networking site at $15bn (£7.3bn). Facebook spurned an offer from Microsoft's rival Google, which was also keen to invest the site.
Microsoft will also sell internet ads for Facebook outside the United States as part of the deal that took several weeks of negotiating. Mark Zuckerberg started the online social networking site in his Harvard University dorm room less than four years ago. [more inside]
feedback.
No nudes is good nudes?
Nudism, in the modern, Western, sense seems to have started in Germany (NSFW) back around the turn of the century, and despite the efforts of the Nazis to eradicate the practice Free Body Culture (FKK), as the Germans call it, enjoyed great popularity in East Germany, the Communists thought it expressed solidarity, and everyone else thought it reflected West German freedoms they were being denied. After the reunification it turns out the West Germans aren't so hot on FKK after all...
In Germany opponents say nudism is disorderly, in the USA they say its child porn in disguise (SFW) Laws in the USA vary widely. In Arkansas its not only illegal to be nude, but its also illegal to talk about nudism, while in New York its legal for women to be topless, as long as they aren't being paid for it. As usual the gods send mixed messages.
The Williamsburg Avenger
When two Williamsburg hipsters met at a party, they exchanged more than just telephone numbers. Hell hath no fury like a hipster infected. Meet the Williamsburg Avenger. (via Gawker)
French Theory
This post isn't about the great Belgian guitarist Philip Catherine - too many guitar posts recently - it isn't about the Belgian singer Katerine (nothing to say). It is about the French singer Philippe Katerine, who has been changing the way lyrics are written, as well as giving a whole range of new topics to French song. With Je vous emmerde (F*** you) he explains what's on a loser's mind. Excuse-moi is about the things a man focuses on during sexual intercourse in order to avoid early ejaculation. The individual struggling with an meaningless society is always present : Borderline (warcraft version with English subtitles). His lists and his humor clearly link his work with the texts of Poets like Raymond Queneau, Boris Vian (and Serge Gainsbourg), or the prose of Georges Perec. He can be Elegiac, Paradoxical, Funky, prosaic, he's always twofold.
I wants to get funked up.
From 50's doo-wop crooner (and hairstylist extraordinaire) to 60's soul stepper to 70's psychedelic funk overlord and beyond, Parliament Funkadelic: One Nation Under A Groove takes a loving, informative and very entertaining look at the career of the legendary George Clinton and his unstoppable, hydra-headed funk machine. [more inside]
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