February 7, 2008
How to grow a glacier
Villagers in the mountains of northern India and Pakistan have been growing their own glaciers for centuries. They're small domesticated glaciers, cultivated by hand, and they provide a reliable source of water for agriculture. Legend has it that they made glaciers to block mountain passes and keep the Mongol Hordes out! More detail in New Scientist - subscription required, but you can probably see this instruction sheet.
Brodner's Take on the Primaries
Cartoonist Steve Brodner sketches the American candidates for president as Odd Couples in a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World. Best. McCain. Evah.
Labyrinth 2.0 in flash
Hide an image in html
Hide an image in html... a neat CSS trick. Highlight the block of text at the bottom of the page as if you were going to cut & paste it. [more inside]
All the better to see you with
As a photographer, you need to get close to your subject. But sometimes things get between you and your subject. Things such as state lines, restraining orders, and guard patrols that can keep you miles away from the people you want to shoot. What do you do at times like this? Get a bigger lens. [more inside]
"Are you there God? It's me Kibbutz"
Got a question for God? Tough. But godsbot the Christian Robot might be the next best thing. A $10 donation (minimum) will get you one year of access--or at least click the Google ads. More in the press release. Oh, and via.
Happy lunar new year!
Celebrate by wearing your best hanbok!
Like Paris Hilton. Or Venus Williams. Or random Korean celebs. Don't forget to dress the dog!
Koreans wear traditional dress, hanbok, during the holidays and for major events such as weddings or funerals. Designers continue to reinterpret it, while colorful variations on styles of centuries past make their way to films and TV.
The movie is Untold Scandal, the TV drama is Hwang Jin Yi.
(My)Folia
Gardeners unite! Folia is a new website for gardeners to organize, document and share their adventures. And now you too can obsess about your seed saving and hardiness zones. [more inside]
the other Public Enemy + Anthrax collaboration
The Joseph Curseen, Jr., and Thomas Morris, Jr., Processing and Distribution Center opened in December 2003 with little fanfare. Formerly the Brentwood (D.C.) Post Office, it was renamed by House Resolution 3287 in honor of the two postal workers killed after two letters containing anthrax passed through on their way to Capitol Hill. [more inside]
Trebek: the glue that holds television together.
Having hosted over 5,000 episodes of Jeopardy, it would be impossible for Alex Trebek not to spaz out once in a while. Here are some of those magical times (this ones got swearing...). Trust me, nobody else in the world swears with as much raw talent.
Slow Flash interface that's actually worth it.
Very cool demos in Flash (can be very slow loading).
What are you looking at?
CringeFilter
Across the nation, not long ago, millions cringed watched enrapt as a collection of earnest young celebrities musically celebrated Barack Obama with the "Yes, We Can" video. Not to be outdone, most of Pearl Jam (mysteriously, bellower Eddie Vedder abstained) united to record a...a...a cover of Bill Haley's "Rock Around the Clock." Retitled...oh, I think you can guess.
Your tax dollars at work.
Interested on how the gummint is using Spectral Sensing Technology do defend us from attacks? You'll feel much safer after viewing the Futuristic Sensor System Dramatic Research Presentation of the 2008 International Symposium on Spectral Sensing Research (ISSSR-2008). (The tour of the Conference Site is in the same vein, with different music.)
Exploration Baltimore
The yearly Best of Baltimore awards released by Baltimore City Paper have been providing a guide to Charm City for over a decade. You can find the best independent bookstores, theater, nachos, and plumbers. Or perhaps your tastes run more exotic--do you need the best constant reminder that Peter Angelos is the anti-Christ? The best place to get run over by bicyclists while hiking? Or the best place to make fun of stressed-out PreMeds? And there are always surprising picks; for example, check out the 2006 winner for best cheap entertainment. So when you're planning your next Baltimore visit browse the archives and find somewhere to enjoy yourself.
This Dying City
Cleveland is dying, and it is beautiful. A collection of stark photographs of Cleveland as it is dying before our very eyes.
Political Emotions
The Feel Tank. "We are a feel tank, but this does not mean that we do not think. We are governed by outrage that the desires and demands for a less bad life and a better good life continue to go unrecognized."
Secret Military Patches
I Could Tell You But Then You Would Have to Be Destroyed by Me is a new book by author and interesting person Trevor Paglen. He collects patches designed by military personnel to commemorate secret "black-ops" projects.
Let me through, I'm a nosy person
Curious why the power is out at your office or the fire engines are rushing past your home? If you live in Seattle, public911 might be able to tell you.
Mixing Oil, Water, and Little Falling People
The Falling Sand Game is an engrossing but hard-to-describe online toy/game that lets you create environments using falling streams of sand, water, oil, and salt by adding fire, plants, clay, and other substances. Inspired by The Falling Sand Game are a number of variations, such as PyroSand, featuring many kinds of explosives, and Hell of Sand, with little people who you can torture. One of the most interesting versions is The Powder Game, which lets you paint with superballs, adjust air pressure, and build very satisfying volcanoes and gardens. For even more, WxSand [downloadable .exe] is a Windows version with lots more options and many interesting mods. [Games are Java applets and are incredibly addictive, especially The Powder Game]
"You just heard the drums. It seemed like he kept them going forever."
Mixed With Love: The Musical World Of Walter Gibbons: "This tale begins with a skinny white DJ mixing between the breaks of obscure Motown records with the ambidextrous intensity of an octopus on speed. It closes with the same man, sick with Aids and all but blind, fumbling for gospel records as he spins up eternal hope in a fading dusk. In between, Walter Gibbons transformed the art of DJing and marked out the future co-ordinates of remixology." [more inside]
Nothing's gonna change my world?
Fears that malevolent aliens will tune into this week's broadcast of The Beatles' song "Across the Universe" have been voiced by scientists.
It takes a woman.....
The First Women Barefoot Solar Engineers Of The World ( youtube ) trained at the Barefoot College in Rajasthan. Using traditional puppetry as an educational medium, Sanjit Bunker Roy's school has been causing a quiet but sure revolution in sustainable development for over 30 years. ( previously )
Fat Ass
Skinny is in for male models. Ever since Hedi Slimane joined Dior Homme, male models are becoming skinnier and skinnier. The reduction in male silhouette means that the male supermodels of the early naughts (such as Tyson Ballou and Tyson Beckford) have stopped heading to Europe for casting calls. With the Council of Fashion Designers of America releasing health guides for female models just last year, it seems that the fashion industry wants their men 6 feet tall and with a 28 inch waist. The good news? I finally will be able to find pants that fit me.
The Cult of Wikipedia
The Cult of Wikipedia - An expose by The Register on conflict of interest at Wikipedia.
Times ain't Like They Used To Be: Richard "Rabbit" Brown, New Orleans Songster
In 1900 they were everywhere. Singing on street corners, in front of circus entrances, or just moving down the dusty roads of the South, playing anywhere a crowd might be cajoled into donating a dime to the cause. To survive they played any request--ballads, popular tunes, white hillbilly music, hymns, and the newly emerged blues. Songsters were the first folk musicians to be "professional" ...Most songsters faded into the past. A few waxed recordings, leaving a tempting glance into their world--and many questions. Such is the case with Richard "Rabbit" Brown, one of the most celebrated songsters and the only one from New Orleans to record.Times ain't Like They Used To Be: Richard "Rabbit" Brown, New Orleans Songster--so, James Alley Blues is the song most everyone names as Brown's greatest and, now, you can play it online here. [more inside]
The Many Worlds of Artist Suzanne Treister
The website of artist Suzanne Treister holds many treasures, such as watercolors based on NATO's item codification system, reimaginings of the front pages of various newspapers as alchemical drawings, invented Amiga videogame stills and, my favorite, the huge images from Hexen2039 - new military-occult technologies for psychological warfare. She's also the director of the International Corporation of Lost Structures and the Institute of Militronics and Advanced Time Interventionality, an organization committed to time travel based research since 2005. Rumor has it that Treister and IMATI star researcher Rosalind Brodsky are one and the same person. The Rosalind Brodsky page has a ton of stuff on it. Here's a small sample: Time Travel Equipment Designs, Brodsky's Delusional Watercolours, Biography of Rosalind Brodsky and Time Traveling Costumes.
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