This beautiful visualization of the ebb and flow of color over the seasons of he year based on photographs of the Boston Common posted to Flickr and using an algorithm developed by Fernanda Viégas and Martin Wattenberg whose medium is data visualization.
Summer is at the top, winter on the bottom. HT Jason Kottke.
Maybe, it's because I never had a real dollhouse as a young girl, but I am just enchanted by this.
You can ever buy a do-it-yourself personal theater kit here for $19.95 plus shipping.
The Daily Mail has collected some wonderful nature Valentine landscapes suitable for everyone. Enjoy.
Absolutely stunning body art by Craig Tracy with more examples here. Above is 'Butterfly'. I'll leave it to you to find the human body.
Just look at these "food flags" created for the Sydney International Food Festival.
It's basil, pasta and tomatoes for Italy.
This is so great. I have never seen a baby dance like this.
It's the unique, but magical combination of the sweet, the salty and the savory that sets them apart from any confections you’ve probably ever tasted.
I love these Birds on the Wires from Jarbas Agnelli on Vimeo.
I saw a picture of birds on the electric wires. I cut out the photo and decided to make a song, using the exact location of the birds as notes (no Photoshop edit). I knew it wasn't the most original idea in the universe. I was just curious to hear what melody the birds were creating.
Part of the Unseen Harmony can also be heard in the Sound of Your Cells that make music way down at the molecular level.
Tracey Raver is the photographer from Nebraska who, with her sister, captures these adorable photos of babies sleeping. Sweet dreams: The cutest baby pictures you'll ever see. Inspiration for new parents and grandparents.
This is a wonderful piece by WJ Francisco
Who knew that Yosemite was a hotspot for lunar rainbows also known as moonbows
Here's what the pioneering naturalist John Muir wrote about seeing such a sight in his 1912 book, The Yosemite.
“This grand arc of color, glowing in mild, shapely beauty in so weird and huge a chamber of night shadows, and amid the rush and roar and tumultuous dashing of this thunder-voiced fall, is one of the most impressive and most cheering of all the blessed mountain evangels.”
Thanks to Environmental Graffiti who has much more on The Elusive Beauty of Lunar Rainbows.
The artist is Scott Wade from Texas
The images are so incredible that motorists often stop at traffic lights and jump out of their own cars to admire them.
See more at A life of car grime
He said: 'I lived on a long, dirt road for over 20 years. Our cars were always dirty and I would often doodle in the dust on the rear windows of our cars.
'Mostly I would draw funny faces, then I started experimenting with ways to get shading.
'At first I would use the pads of my fingers and brush very lightly to get grey tones.
'Once I tried using the chewed-up end of a popsicle stick as a brush - I liked the effect, so I started trying paintbrushes, and eventually developed the techniques I use today.'
The feel good story of the day
Lost dog saves man with Down Syndrome
15 Facts You Didn't Know About Your Body
#4. Every person has a unique tongue print
I never knew there was such a thing as a bubbleologist, but Samsom Bubbleman blows the world's largest free-floating bubble using a top-secret mixture he has developed.
More amazing photos of Sam Heath - his real name - at the link. Amazing he makes a living doing what he does best.
Jack Russells can do just about anything, but I've never heard of one who earned his keep, that is until Tillamook Cheddar.
Stepping back from the sheet of paper before her, Tillie the artist cocks her head, surveys her work, then launches into a frenzy of finishing touches. No one minds that she appears to be making a dog’s breakfast of her latest assignment.
As the world’s pre-eminent canine painter, the ten-year-old Jack Russell terrier — full name Tillamook Cheddar — has clawed her way up to become something of a big cheese in the art world.
Notching up her 20th solo exhibition, she has earned more than $100,000 from sales of her work, visited five countries and drawn comparisons with the abstract expressionist Jackson Pollock.
“If you put her work before someone without telling them that a dog did it, they wouldn’t be able to tell it apart from a human artist’s,” said Jane Hart, curator of the Hollywood Art and Culture Centre in Hollywood, Florida.
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Her owner, F. Bowman Hastie III, of Brooklyn, New York, gets her started by rubbing paint from an oil-stick on to vellum, taping it colour-side down on to lithograph paper and laying a sheet of protective plastic film on top. Tillie then sets to work, scratching and biting at the vellum through the plastic, the pressure of her claws, paws and teeth transferring the coloured pigment on to the paper below.
Photographer Richard Heeks, from Exeter, used a fast shutter speed of 1/500th of a second and chose a perfect wind-free day so nothing would disturb his shoot, while his wife Sarah provided the all-important finger.
A bubble is made up of three layers - one thin layer of water sandwiched between two layers of soap molecules.
As Mrs Heeks's finger breaks the surface tension, the perfect sphere is replaced by a round mass of soapy droplets which dissolve into the air. And the bubble is gone.
The pair have become inseparable since Bramble, the baby eagle owl, was taken in at a bird of prey centre.
Sophie, three, used her maternal nature to give Bramble a quick clean as a chick. Now the bird flies into the main house for a spruce-up every day and sits while Sophie licks her feathers and beak.
Take 40 seconds and watch as the Milky Way passes over the night sky
Galactic Center of Milky Way Rises over Texas Star Party from William Castleman on Vimeo. via Neatorama
Some news from Boston you may have missed.
Sal DiMasi, former Speaker of the Massachusetts House who resigned in January was indicted on public corruption charges for pocketing thousands of dollars in payments from a software company while using his office to make sure that company won state contracts.
That makes three speakers in a row indicted, two already convicted, writes Howie Carr in Bay State run by men of steal. "This isn't a democracy, it's a kleptocracy."
A corruption "Hat-trick". Massive corruption is the primary reason why it's not good when one party continues decade after decade to dominate local politics.
One 93-year-old, looking for a handicap parking spot at a Wal-Mart, hit the gas instead of the brakes and shot 25 feet inside the store, injuring nine people, including a mother and her one year old child.
While another old man, Roger Gentilhomme went out to play tennis for 2 hours, like he does every day, to celebrate his 100th birthday.
"The big question everyone asks is, 'What do you attribute this to?' " Gentilhomme said during a conversation at his home in Falmouth before driving himself to tennis. "Well, I can't attribute it to anything. I haven't the slightest idea why I'm here. But - and here's what I tell everyone - I do watch out for myself. If something starts irritating me, I try to find out what it is and get it fixed.
What leaped out for me was the Mass company that lists cadavers among its assets
Innovative Spinal Technologies, a medical device maker, shut down this year and listed among its assets in a federal bankruptcy filing, nine human bodies, including "eight previously used" cadavers.
James Tarento gibed, "What we want to how the company managed to find a cadaver that wasn't previously used!"
An advertisement from Dr. Boli's Celebrated Magazine.
I had never heard of this illustrious gentleman who was not only responsible for the invention of the letter M, but also for the construction of Portugal so that Portuguese refugees might have a home of their own.
I never noticed the FedEx arrow between the "E" and the "x", but now that I've seen it, I'll look for it on every truck.
Here are 25 more logos with hidden messages via Kottke
I love this photo and Zachary Boyd too. He was asleep when a firefight erupted in Afghanistan with only time to grab his helmet, body armor and gun. The red t-shirt, flip-flops and I love New York pink boxers which, considering he joined the Army because of the 9/11 attacks seem oddly appropriate for this 19-year-old Army Specialist and endearingly American.
Most of the time his appearance on the Afghanistan's frontline would have gone unnoticed by the eyes of the world.
However, Boyd managed to pick the day when a photographer was on hand to capture him going into battle in the pink boxers, red t-shirt and flimsy footwear.
The image of the fight at Firebase Restrepo in the Korengal Valley of Kunar Province later ended up on the front page of The New York Times.
'I knew he was a boxer guy. I knew that for sure. I did not know they were pink, and I didn't know they said, 'I love New York,' father Tommy Boyd told his local Texas radio station WBAP.
'After I saw the picture I just laughed for about five minutes.'
Boyd phoned his mother Sheree Boyd to warn her that he might be in the paper.
'He said: "I hear the Times is what they put on the President's desk",' she said.
'Then he told us, "I may not have a job any more after the President has seen me out of uniform".
Karen Hall in This Explains Everything talks about railroad tracks and Roman war chariots .
So, a major Space Shuttle design feature of what is arguably the world's most advanced transportation system was determined over two thousand years ago by the width of a horse's ass. And you thought being a horse's ass wasn't important? Ancient horse's asses control almost everything...
"To see a world in a grain of sand and heaven in a wild flower, Hold infinity in the palm of your hand and eternity in an hour."
William Blake
I'm a big fan of microphotography and Dr. Gary Greenberg opens up a whole new world that lies under our feet.
"A Grain of Sand: Nature's Secret Wonder" (Gary Greenberg)
I always wondered how the Scots came up with plaid.
My favorite Irish fiddler Martin Hayes and American guitarist Denis Cahill
They don't perform in the States very often. Most of the time, they are in Europe or Ireland, but if you want to catch them live, check out their website here
Wired has a great story on The Untold Story of the World's Biggest Diamond Heist.
Read the whole thing and you'll get some good tips should you want to plan your own heist but you won't be able to figure out who got the diamonds.
They were accused of breaking into the Antwerp Diamond Center’s supersecure vault and stealing $100 million in diamonds, gold and jewelry. The loot was never found, but their trash was.
Ah the wonders of the web where all sorts of connections can be made while I wait to clear the fifteen inches of snow that appeared overnight. Ah, the great pleasures of a snow day.
A while back, I started a draft post on the pre-posthumous memoir by J.G Ballard after I came across this interview about his new book in LA Weekly
I believe in the power of the imagination to remake the world, to release the truth within us, to hold back the night, to transcend death, to charm motorways, to ingratiate ourselves with birds, to enlist the confidences of madmen.
I believe in the non-existence of the past, in the death of the future, and the infinite possibilities of the present.
"Miracles of Life: Shanghai to Shepperton: An Autobiography" (J. G. Ballard)
I tucked it away in draft form until this morning when I happened upon Happy St David's Day at Brits at their Best, a favorite blog of mine.
St. David (Dewi Sant in Welsh), a bishop of Wales (c 500-589) became its patron saint (as well as the patron saint of vegetarians and poets). Today the Welsh wear a leek in memory of some ancient battle against the Saxons where Bishop David advised them to wear leeks on their hats to distinguish themselves from their enemies. Knowing that a storm was coming, coincidentally yesterday I made a potato and leek soup (absolutely delicious with lots of bacon bits and parsley as garnish).
Checking with the Catholic encyclopedia I learned that St David was conceived in violence, the product of the rape of his mother, a nun, by Sandde, King of Ceredigion, said by some to be King Arthur's nephew. According to legend the poor woman gave birth on a cliff top during a violent storm.
David founded a number of churches and monasteries among them Glastonbury, Bath and Leominster, all while living a life of austerity (no meat, no beer) and great holiness. His last words 'Be joyful, and keep your faith and your creed. Do the little things that you have seen me do and heard about" has become a very well-known phrase in Welsh 'Do the little things in life'. My little thing for St David.
Here's the famous Welsh singer, Bryn Terfel, who gives shivers to The Anchoress, singing a lullaby, a love song, from Wales, courtesy of the Cat and David, best Brits.
Sleep my baby, at my breast,
Tis a mothers arms round you.
Make yourself a snug, warm nest.
Feel my love forever new.
Harm will not meet you in sleep,
Hurt will always pass you by.
Child beloved, always youll keep,
In sleep gentle, mothers breast nigh.
Sleep in peace tonight, sleep,
O sleep gently, what a sight.
A smile I see in slumber deep,
What visions make your face bright?
Are the angels above smiling,
At you in your peaceful rest?
Are you beaming back while in
Peaceful slumber on mothers breast?
Do not fear the sound, its a breeze
Brushing leaves against the door.
Do not dread the murmuring seas,
Lonely waves washing the shore.
Sleep child mine, theres nothing here,
While in slumber at my breast,
Angels smiling, have no fear,
Holy angels guard your rest.
Was I surprised to that that lullaby was prominently featured in the movie Empire of the Sun, based on the semi-autographical novel of the same name by J.F. Ballard. I'd come full circle
Produced by Steven Speilberg with screenplay by Tom Stoddard, Empire of the Sun, released in 1987, tells the story of a young boy from an aristocratic British family living in Shanghai in 1941 just as the Japanese invaded. Separated from his parents, young Jamie is captured and taken to a Japanese POW camp for British civilians where he comes to admire both the Japanese and the captured American pilots. Jamie is played wonderfully by a very young Christian Bale who is befriended by a laid-back captured American pilot Basie played by John Malkovich.
When I watched the trailer again, I remembered how much I loved the movie. A critical success, it won no Oscars despite several nominations. I just bought it on Amazon for less than $10. You can too.
"Empire of the Sun" (Steven Spielberg)
Ireland's worst driver, Prawo Jazdy, wanted in counties from Cork to Cavan, managed to evade justice by giving a different address each time he was stopped, until his cover was blown.
"Prawo Jazdy is actually the Polish for driving licence and not the first and surname on the licence," read a letter from June 2007 from an officer working within the Garda's traffic division.
"Having noticed this, I decided to check and see how many times officers have made this mistake.
"It is quite embarrassing to see that the system has created Prawo Jazdy as a person with over 50 identities."
This is hilarious - Ellen DeGeneres talks to Gladys from Austin, Texas.
Another wonder, Hills are alive with the sound of ants.
Advances in audio technology have enabled scientists to discover that ants routinely talk to each other in their nests.
Most ants have a natural washboard and plectrum built into their abdomens that they can rub together to communicate using sound.
Using miniaturised microphones and speakers that can be inserted unobtrusively into nests, researchers established that the queens can issue instructions to their workers.
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Professor Jeremy Thomas, of the University of Oxford, said improvements in technology had made the discoveries possible because it meant the ants could be recorded and subjected to playbacks without becoming alarmed.
By placing miniature speakers into the nest and playing back sounds made by a queen, the researchers were able to persuade ants to stand to attention.
“When we played the queen sounds they did 'en garde' behaviour. They would stand motionless with their antennae held out and their jaws apart for hours - the moment anyone goes near they will attack,” he said.
My vote for best Superbowl commercial
Is prejudice against redheads, the last acceptable prejudice?
In 15th-century Germany, redheads were seen as witches - 45,000 were tortured and murdered. Meanwhile, Egyptians burned gingers alive, and the Greeks reckoned they turned into vampires when they died.
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t the same time there are fears that gingers may be extinct by 2060 because only 2% of the world's population are gingers, and that number is shrinking.
Maybe it was the first.
Just little more than a year ago, ancient DNA retrieved from the bones of two Neanderthals revealed the gene for red hair and pale skin.
Now maybe, probably, there was as much variety in skin and hair color among Neanderthals as we find in humans, but no one knows why they all died out. Did both humans and Neanderthals evolve the MC1R gene? Or was it the result of intermarriage?
Did the famous redheads in history, Napoleon, Lizzie Borden, Emily Dickinson, Thomas Jefferson, James Joyce, Vincent Van Gogh. Elizabeth I , Winston Churchill and Lucille Ball, carry with them genes from a non-human ancestor?
Mark Twain, another redhead, wondered about the same thing, only he concluded, "While the rest of the species is descended from apes, redheads are descended from cats."
Just an amazing photo of a lighthouse from Neatorama
that reminds me of the logo for Fidelity Investments which, despite its long exposure of years on millions of pieces of paper, I'm sure most of you couldn't recall the logo I didn't remind you.
Another that I love is this long exposure of the Eiger peak in Switzerland.
These are the mountains above Grindelwald, high in the Jungfrau, where I did the best and scariest skiing in my life.
The difference between men and women explained.
Pet dogs rival humans for emotional satisfaction
After playing with their dogs, their owners experience a burst of oxytocin, the hormone linked to infant care and romantic love.
After watching this YouTube, the dog Rookie has burst after burst while dancing with his owner, Carolyn Scott.
Is there nothing bacon can't do?
Ray Zahab, Kevin Vallely and Richard Weber said they had completed the 1,130 km (700 miles) journey in 33 days, 23 hours and 30 minutes.
They hey suffered white-out but survived on a high-calorie diet of deep-fried bacon, cheese and butter.
From MSNBC
Zahab and his teammates — Kevin Vallely of North Vancouver and Richard Weber of Alcove, Quebec — documented their journey on their Web site, using their satellite phone to post photos and podcasts along the way. They pulled 170-pound sleds of equipment, with Zahab traveling on foot and on snowshoes while the other two men skied. At night, they hunkered down in a tent to sleep.
The men suffered altitude sickness, vertigo and massive, painful blisters. They kept themselves fueled with a 7,000-calorie-a-day diet of deep-fried bacon, cheese and huge chunks of butter.
"I am dying for pizza," Zahab said with a sigh Friday. "All I've been thinking about is pizza."
He was longing, too, for his 6-month-old daughter, Mia Sahara, and wife of two years, Kathy.
"All I would do is think about them and think about how I would spend the day with them and how I would never complain about changing a diaper again," he said.
This Christmas tree can't be topped.
Just watch the air traffic
Meet Harvey the dog who gets his daily exercise riding the waves
"His name is Harvey and he's a surfer of the highest pedigree.
After all, it's not everyone who can balance with four feet on the board at once - let alone use his tail as a rudder.
The three-year-old labrador is the pet of Scott Pearson and his 16-year-old son James, both keen surfers. He regularly joins them on Tynemouth beach in North Tyne-side, where he has his own sponge surfboard which he carries in and out of the waves in his jaws.
'He's been in the water ever since he was a pup,' said 43-year-old Mr Pearson, from Gosforth.
'Whenever we're out surfing he's always following us - he never stays on the beach.'
James, who hopes to join the British surfing team said Harvey first took to a surfboard this summer.
'My Dad and I were out paddling on the board and Harvey just swam out to us and we put him on the board. "He's a real natural and now every time he is out on his board people watch in amazement."
No matter how skillful you are with leftovers from yesterday's meal, you will never reach the sublime heights that Carl Warner has with his foodscapes.
Below is a salmon sea and a peapod boat sailing away from a land made of bread and potatoes under waving dill fronds.
Surprise: Halloween's Not a Pagan Festival After All
The holiday and its customs are completely Christian and uniquely American.
Here are some riddles for the older trick or treaters.
Q: How do you make a witch stew?
A: Keep her waiting for hours.
Q: What do you call a person who puts rat poison in a person's Corn Flakes?
A: A cereal killer
Q: What happened to the guy who couldn't keep up payments to his exorcist?
A: He was repossessed.
Q: What is a vampires favourite mode of transportation?
A: A blood vessel.
Q: Why don't witches like to ride their brooms when they're angry?
A: They're afraid of flying off the handle.
Q: What do you call a wicked witch who lives by the sea?
A: A Sand-witch
Q: What happens when a ghost gets lost in a fog?
A: He's mist.
Q: How do ghosts begin their letters?
A: "Tomb it may concern..."
Q: What do you call a ghost with a broken leg?
A: Hoblin Goblin.
Q: What kind of street does a ghost like best?
A: A dead end.
Q: How do you know if a ghost is lying?
A: You can see right through him.
Q: Where do ghosts go on vacation?
A: Lake Erie.
Q: Why are there fences around cemeteries?
A: Because people are dying to get in.
Q: How is a werewolf like a computer?
A: They both have megabytes.
Q: Why didn't the skeleton dance at the Halloween party?
A: It had no body to dance with.
Q: When does a skeleton laugh?
A: When something tickles his funny bone.
Q: Who does a ghoul fall in love with?
A: His ghoul friend.
Art and science collide in microscopic pictures of nature.
These are the wing scales of a moth
Gallows humor it is, but that's when you need it most.
With all the turmoil in the market today and the collapse of Lehman Bros and acquisition of Merrill Lynch by Bank of America many more mergers and takeovers can be expected:
1.) Hale Business Systems, Mary Kay Cosmetics, Fuller Brush, and W R. Grace Co. Will merge and become: Hale, Mary, Fuller, Grace.
2.) Polygram Records, Warner Bros., and Zesta Crackers join forces and become: Poly, Warner Cracker.
3.) 3M will merge with Goodyear and become: MMMGood.
4. Zippo Manufacturing, Audi Motors, Dofasco, and Dakota Mining will merge and become: ZipAudiDoDa .
5. FedEx is expected to join its competitor, UPS, and become: FedUP.
6. Fairchild Electronics and Honeywell Computers will become: Fairwell Honeychild.
7. Grey Poupon and Docker Pants are expected to become: PouponPants.
8. Knotts Berry Farm and the National Organization of Women will become: Knott NOW!
And finally...
9. Victoria 's Secret and Smith &Wesson will merge under the new name: TittyTittyBangBang
From Bussorah
The funniest things I found from the Democratic convention.
From the Sunday Times, AA Gill travels to Denver and writes as only a Brit can - think Monty Python with a slight sneer - and the results are hilarious with
Barack Obama's army with epic razzamatazz .
Cumulatively, these stories sound like the Yorkshireman’s sketch from Monty Python as a 12-step share. Each silky, coiffured and polished senator, congressman and governor outdoes the other with Stygian hardship. The effect is so cloyingly sentimental, it could give cynicism diabetes. But I am again the only one who finds the parade of Little Nell revelations hideously patronising. The implication being that if you don’t wind up at least as an Ivy League lawyer, then your poverty wasn’t bad enough and your dream isn’t lavish and American enough. The only person who doesn’t tell us about growing up in a bucket under the sink is Ted Kennedy, because we already know that he was born into patrician splendour paid for by illegal whisky-running during prohibition.
Peggy Noonan brings the house down
The hilarious Jason Mattara goes undercover with a petition to bring Cinemax, Netflix, and MSNBC to Guatanamo prisoners. The hippies sign. Via Hot Air
I laugh every time I watch this.
The new Bio-Optic Organized Knowledge Device
BOOK is a revolutionary breakthrough in technology: no wires, no electric circuits, no batteries, nothing to be connected or switched on. It’s so easy to use, even a child can operate it.
Compact and portable, it can be used anywhere — even sitting in an armchair by the fire — yet it is powerful enough to hold as much information as a CD-ROM.
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The “browse” feature allows you to move instantly to any sheet, and move forward or backward as you wish. Many come with an “index” feature, which pin-points the exact location of any selected information for instant retrieval.
An optional “BOOKmark” accessory allows you to open BOOK to the exact place you left it in a previous session — even if the BOOK has been closed.
One of the pleasures of growing older is recognizing the threads that appear again and again in the tapestry of one's life. One thread that always makes me laugh is flatulence.
I told this story in Five Things You Don't Know About Me.
When I began working at the Department of Interior as the Special Assistant to the Solicitor, I wrote a number of speeches for the Solicitor, one of which became infamous, picked up by the Associated Press across the country and, in the end, selected by Parade magazine in its year-end round-up as the best or funniest environmental stories of the year, I can't remember which.
Let's face it, it's hard to find something interesting and relevant to write about for the South Dakota Stockgrowers Association, - that's cattlemen to you. So, when in the course of reading reports from the EPA, and the International Climate Change Committee, I came across the fact that grants were being awarded to study cow flatulence and digestion as one of the major sources of methane contributing to climate change, I knew I had a winner. "Windy cows" it was. The speech wrote itself and the cattlemen loved it.
I followed that with More on Cow Flatulence when years later the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization called livestock a major threat to the environment contributing more to greenhouse emissions than all transportation combined.
So the news that a flatulence inoculation has been developed in New Zealand was of more than passing interest and not just because it gives me an excuse to post one of the funniest jokes ever.
George W. Bush not only smiles and waves nicely, always knows the right thing to say, too!
Bush and the Queen at London Heathrow, a 300-foot long red carpet is stretched out to Air Force One and Mr. Bush strides to a warm but dignified handshake from Queen Elizabeth II.
They ride in a silver 1934 Bentley limousine to the edge of central London where they board an open 17th century coach hitched to six magnificent white matching horses.
As they ride toward Buckingham Palace, each looking sideways and waving to the thousands of cheering Britons lining the streets, all is going well.
But suddenly the right rear horse lets fly with the most horrendous, earth-rending, eye-smarting blast of gastronomic flatulence ever heard in the British Empire, including Bermuda, Tortola and other islands.
It shakes the coach.
Uncomfortable, but under control, the two dignitaries of state do their best to ignore the whole incident, but then the Queen decides that's ridiculous.
She turns to Mr. Bush and explains, "Mr. President, please accept my regrets. I'm sure you understand that there are some things that even a Queen cannot control."
George W. Bush, ever the gentleman, replies, "Your Majesty, please don't give the matter another thought. You know, if you hadn't said something, I would have thought it was one of the horses."
A Swedish student at the Beckmans College of Design in Stockholm had a great idea for his final project - the biggest drawing in the world.
Using a GPS device in a briefcase as his pen, and very exact travel directions to DHL, he drew a self-portrait on our planet. You can see how he did it here.
"Join me on the bandwagon of my own uncertainty," Taylor Mali.
Celebrity chef Gordon Ramsey wants to outlaw out-of-season vegetables
making out-of-season produce illegal would raise "levels of inspiration".
"There should be stringent laws, licensing laws, to make sure produce is only used in season and season only," he said.
Man spends 18 hours in police cell and has his DNA taken for 'dropping an apple core', a charge he denies.
From Grandma's House
Listen up brothers and sisters, come here my desperate tale
I speak of our friends of nature, trapped in the dirt like a jail
Vegtables live in oppression, served on out tables each night
This killing of veggies is madness, i say we take up the fight
Salads are only for murderers, cole slaw's a fascist regime
Don't think that they don't have feelings, just cause a radish can't scream
I've heard the screams of the vegetables, watching their skins being peeled
Grated and steamed with no mercy.. how do you think that feels?
Carrot juice constitutes murder.. greenhouses prisons for slaves
It's time to stop all this gardening.. let's call a spade a spade.
I meant to post this last week, so you may have already see it. From Good Eats
The Dog's Diary
8:00 am - Dog food! My favorite thing!
9:30 am - A car ride! My favorite thing!
9:40 am - A walk in the park! My favorite thing!
10:30 am - Got rubbed and petted! My favorite thing!
12:00 pm - Milk bones! My favorite thing!
1:00 pm - Played in the yard! My favorite thing!
3:00 pm - Wagged my tail! My favorite thing!
5:00 pm - Dinner! My favorite thing!
7:00 pm - Got to play ball! My favorite thing!
8:00 pm - Wow! Watched TV with the people! My favorite thing!
11:00 pm - Sleeping on the bed! My favorite thing!
The Cat's Diary
Day 983 of My Captivity
My captors continue to taunt me with bizarre little dangling objects. They dine lavishly on fresh meat, while the other inmates and I are fed hash or some sort of dry nuggets. Although I make my contempt for the rations perfectly clear, I nevertheless must eat something in order to keep up my strength.
The only thing that keeps me going is my dream of escape. In an attempt to disgust them, I once again vomit on the carpet. Today I decapitated a mouse and dropped its headless body at their feet. I had hoped this would strike fear into their hearts, since it clearly demonstrates my capabilities. However, they merely made condescending comments about what a "good little hunter" I am. Bastards!
There was some sort of assembly of their accomplices tonight. I was placed in solitary confinement for the duration of the event. However, I could hear the noises and smell the food. I overheard that my confinement was due to the power of "allergies." I must learn what this means, and how to use it to my advantage.
Today I was almost successful in an attempt to assassinate one of my tormentors by weaving around his feet as he was walking. I must try this again tomorrow, but at the top of the stairs.
I am convinced that the other prisoners here are flunkies and snitches. The dog receives special privileges. He is regularly released, and seems to be more than willing to return. He is obviously retarded. The bird must be an informant. I observe him communicate with the guards regularly. I am certain that he reports my every move. My captors have arranged protective custody for him in an elevated cell, so he is safe. For now ...
My favorite self-portrait from the Top 10 Self-Portraits of Wired readers.
See them all starting here.
Astonishingly, a fight breaks out behind a television reader at the BBC. You have to watch this one.
Synesthesia, is a most interesting neurological condition that "mixes up the senses". People with synesthesia can have strong color sensations with certain words, associate numbers with sounds or music with colors. James Wannerton has an unusual form of the unusual condition, he tastes words.
Whenever I see a picture of Tony Blair I instantly get the taste of desiccated coconut.
Gordon Brown leaves me with a very strong taste of dirt and Marmite, so he shouldn't count on getting my vote.
George Bush gives me a taste similar to the crusty potato bit on top of a cottage pie.
As I read the New York Times, monosodium glutamate or MSG gives us the taste, umami, that "elusive fifth taste" that rounds out the flavor of everything.
Yes, MSG, the Secret Behind the Savor
But you don't have to search out Japanese seaweed because MSG is a shortcut to that rounder flavor. You won't necessarily under that name on the label, so look for hydrolyzed soy protein or autolyzed yeast, because it's all glutamate and perfectly safe to eat for the vast majority of people.
You can find glutamate in Accent, canned chicken broth, hoisin, soy and fish sauces, Maggi, onion soup, Goldfish crackers, canned tuna with vegetable broth, canned soup, low-fat yoghurts and ice creams, virtually everything ranch-flavored or cheese-flavored, Pringles and bologna among others.
Nacho-cheese-flavor Doritos, which contain five separate forms of glutamate, may be even richer in umami than the finest kombu dashi (kelp stock) in Japan.
This is so fresh and witty a piece of performance art, you must see it if you haven't already. A grand illusion at Grand Central with 207 adults at frozen play.
And you thought lawyers could never get down and funky. Check out Bob Noone and the Well-Hung Jury singing My Will
via Wills, Trusts & Estates Prof
Postcards home from Roman soldiers in Britain,
They came, they saw...and they asked for new underpants
Now known as the Vindolanda Tablets - after the fort where they were found - the more than 1,000 pieces of birch, alder and oak give an unparalleled, moving and often very funny insight into the life of the Roman soldier stuck miles from home at the end of the first century AD.
--
The letters reveal how the soldiers miss their family and friends back in Gaul - that's where most of them came from...But most of all, how cold they are in the frozen north,
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The funniest letter is a simple list of the clothes sent from the warm south to a poor frozen Roman: "Paria udonum ab Sattua solearum duo et subligariorum duo." Or - socks, two pairs of sandals and two pairs of underpants.
--
Solemnis, in another letter, wrote to his brother Paris: "Hello there. Hope all's well. I'm in top form - and I hope you are, even though you've been so bloody lazy and haven't sent me a single letter.
Human nature and human needs haven't changed at all.
Responding to AP's selection of him as Celebrity of the Year, Steven Colbert sent this email.
"In receiving this award, I am pleased that I was chosen over two great spinners of fantasy — J.K. Rowling and Al Gore. It is truly an honor to be named the Associated Press' Celebrity of the Year. Best of all, this makes me the official front-runner for next year's Drug-Fueled Downward Spiral of the year. P.S. Look for my baby bump this spring!"
Jet from Supermassive Black Hole Seen Blasting Neighboring Galaxy.
You can't see the massive black hole of course, only the blue jet emanating from it.
Black holes ... set loose tremendous bursts of energy as matter swirls around the disk of material that circles the black hole but does not make it in.
That energy, often in the form of highly charged gamma rays and X-rays, shoots out in powerful jets that can be millions of light-years long and 1,000 light-years wide.
Scientists are just beginning to understand these jets, which not only transform matter in their path but also help produce "stellar nurseries," where new stars are formed.
What seems violent may be a form of galactic conception.
You know the Christmas song, "Do You Hear What I Hear?"
Said the little lamb to the shepherd boy,
“Do you hear what I hear?
Ringing through the sky, shepherd boy,
Do you hear what I hear?
A song, a song, high above the tree
With a voice as big as the sea.”
What you don't know is that the song was written during the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 by Noel Regney as he walked down the streets of New York City where despair hung thick in the air when he came upon two babies in strollers looking at each other and smiling.
In the old days, it was not called the Holiday Season; the Christians called it "Christmas" and went to church; the Jews called it "Hanukkah" and went to synagogue; the atheists went to parties and drank. People passing each other on the street would say "Merry Christmas!" or "Happy Hanukkah!" or (to the atheists), "Look out for the wall!"
- Dave Barry
It's necessary to suffer to be beautiful.
Now a man lives to tell what women already know. It's laugh-out-loud funny.
Christopher Hitchens On the Limits of Self-Improvement that involve wraps, Brazilian waxes and veneers.
Part One
The best beer in the world is brewed by Trappist monks in Westvleteren, Belgium. Despite the phenomenal demand for the "holy grail of beers", the monks are resisting pressure to increase production.
"It would interfere with our job of being a monk. We sell beer to live, and not vice versa."
Trappist Command: Thou Shalt Not Buy Too Much of Our Beer. (Wall St Journal subscribers only at least until Murdoch takes over)
From Astronomy Picture of the Day
It all started with beer.
Chocolate that is.
Chocolate began as a status beer
THE chocolate enjoyed around the world today had its origins at least 3100 years ago in Central America not as the sweet treat people now crave but as a celebratory beer-like beverage and status symbol,
Anonymous said, "History flows forward in rivers of beer."
I know I posted about this before years ago, but a friend just sent it to me again. I think I laughed just as much. It's impossible not to.
It's the best Rube Goldberg contraption I've ever seen.
I wish I could embed it but I can't so click on the link.
Good things come to those who wait.
Especially if they love their Guinness.
via Scribal Terror
Annie Liebowitz was commissioned to create new images for the Disney company's Year of a Million Dreams promotion.
Here is Rachel Weisz as Snow White.
Scarlett Johanssen as Cinderella
Julie Andrews as a fairy godmother
See them all in their full glory at the Disney gallery
Iain Gray delivers some delicious snark to Rachel Weisz's comment, "I think you always want to be Snow White."
Really? What, having one’s mother die in childbirth, being despised by your new stepmother to the point where she repeatedly tries to brutally murder you and then spending your days with a bunch of emotionally-stunted gold-diggers who immediately put you to work cleaning and cooking before insisting that you share their beds with them?
It truly is every little girl’s dream…
Shamelessly stolen from Scribal Terror
Although he tried awfully hard, Norman Mailer never succeeded at levitating the Pentagon back in 1968.
Yet, this Dutchman succeed at levitating himself before the White House with ease. How does he do it?
I can't embed so to see Woulter Bijdendijik, the Dutch magician click here.
Kurt Wenner, a former illustrator for NASA, is wowing them in London with his pavement art.
He translated the anamorphism - the technique used by classical artists to create the illusion of height - into a new way of painting to give depth to the street surface.
An amazing story, Aicuna is Not an Albino Town
It is the same message that she had made us read—the one by Carlo Brero, a nearly eighty-year-old Italian who, on September 28, 2006, bade his farewell to La Casa with these words, in Spanish: “I came to this town to find albino genes and I found the happiness of my youth.” Mr. Brero’s farewell letter, written in a trembling hand but with unwavering care, takes up the entire page. Before signing it, he added: “I feel personally content and I think that it’s because of the way of life here: happy children, simple, tranquil, and affable people. Love is found here amid an everyday landscape.”
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It’s like something out of García Márquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude. Once upon a time in northeastern Argentina there was a village of grape and almond farmers and goat breeders. This place, called Aicuña, also known as “the town of the Ormeños,” or later “the mysterious albino town,” remained isolated for more than three centuries, two hundred and fifty years longer than García Márquez’s Macondo. Inbreeding was punished in Macondo by the birth of a boy with a pig’s tail. In Aicuña, say some vicious people in neighboring villages, the punishment is colorless children. Forty-six of them, to be precise, in little more than a century.
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It’s like something out of García Márquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude. Once upon a time in northeastern Argentina there was a village of grape and almond farmers and goat breeders. This place, called Aicuña, also known as “the town of the Ormeños,” or later “the mysterious albino town,” remained isolated for more than three centuries, two hundred and fifty years longer than García Márquez’s Macondo. Inbreeding was punished in Macondo by the birth of a boy with a pig’s tail. In Aicuña, say some vicious people in neighboring villages, the punishment is colorless children. Forty-six of them, to be precise, in little more than a century.
Some Preschoolers' thoughts on aging.
"First they start smooth and when they are going to die, they get pruney"
First they grow up as a young kid...they eat healthy and they get taller. And soon they get much taller and they go to heaven. If they can't walk, they get a wheelchair."
What's with the "scribble scrabble"? Two of the preschoolers call wrinkles scribble scrabble which I kinda like actually.
"They have scrabble scrabble just on her face. And she's got shiny teeth."
Dr. Helen quotes Mary Fensolt saying, The fear of public speaking or performing is more than anything a fear of being eaten."
Building on the theories of sociobiologist Edward O. Wilson, Fensholt argues that historically, being intently scrutinized and singled out was a prelude to being eaten by a predator, so human ancestors evolved a strong fear response against setting themselves apart from the protection of the group.
Catching up on all sorts of stuff over the weekend, I realized I haven't done my "To Do Before You Die List" even though I've already crossed some things off like water rafting through the Grand Canyon and scuba diving on the Great Barrier Reef.
Ten Things to Do Before You Finish This Article.
I've got lots to add. What about you?
Why are yawns so contagious?
I used to tell my sister that it was a battle for oxygen. When one person yawns, they suck up so much oxygen out of the air that the other person is forced to yawn just to stay alive.
Nonsense, but fun. Now scientists are now doing the research, and the first results are in.
What triggers the phenomenon appears to be the capacity for empathy.
Secretary of Defense Robert Gates speaks about the most embarrassing moment of his career.
But I think the most embarrassing moment during my career was when Nixon visited Italy and he met with the Pope, and Melvin Laird was along as Secretary of Defense. Kissinger and Nixon decided that Laird shouldn’t be invited to the meeting with the Pope, as sort of the Minister of War.
And so, Nixon was in the next morning having his private audience with the Pope, and the rest of us were waiting outside. And who should come striding down the hall smoking an enormous cigar but Laird. He had clearly found out about the meeting, probably through good military intelligence. [Laughter]
And Kissinger was kind of beside himself, but he finally said “Well, Mel, at least extinguish the cigar.” So Laird stubbed out his cigar and put it in his pocket.
The American party a few minutes later went in to their general meeting with the pope. Pope was seated at a little table in front, Americans in two rows of high-backed chairs. Back row, Kissinger on the end; Laird next to him. A couple of minutes into the Pope’s remarks, Kissinger heard this little patting sound, and he looked over, and there was a wisp of smoke coming out of Laird’s pocket. [Laughter] The Secretary of State thought nothing of it. A couple of other minutes went by and the secretary heard this patting sound, slapping going on, and he looked over and smoke was billowing out of Laird’s pocket. The Secretary of Defense was on fire. [Laughter]
The American party heard this slapping, and thought they were being queued to applaud. And so they did. [Laughter]
And Henry later told us, “God only knows what his Holiness thought, seeing the American secretary of defense immolating himself, and the entire American party applauding the fact.” [Laughter, Applause
via The Belmont Club
"Beer is the basis of modern static civilization. Because before beer was discovered, people used to wander around and follow goats from place to place. And then they realized that this grain [barley] could be grown and sprouted and made into a bread and crumbled and converted into a liquid which gave a nice, warm, cozy feeling. So gone were the days that they followed goats around. They stayed put while the grain grew and while the beer was brewed. And they made villages out of their tents. And those villages became towns, and those towns became cities. And so here we are in New York, thanks to beer.
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He who drinks beer sleeps well. He who sleeps well cannot sin. He who does not sin goes to heaven.
Charlie Bamforth is the Anheuser-Busch Endowed Professor of Brewing Science at the University of California, Davis.
From Ale's Well with the World, Scientific American.
Here it Goes Again was the top winner in the first annual YouTube Video Awards. You can see the winners and the runners-up.
Most creative Here It Goes Again - 14 million viewers which is not even close to the all time winner for most times viewed- some 45 million of them -Evolution of Dance.
I loved the enchanting Little Girl Giant at Hootsbuddy's Place and soon clicked to read more about The Saga of the Giants. 3 Quarks Daily tells the story beautifully.
16 things it takes most of us 50 years to learn
3. You should never say anything to a woman that even remotely suggests you think she's pregnant unless you can see an actual baby emerging from her at that moment.
4. The one thing that unites all human beings, regardless of age, gender, religion, economic status or ethnic background, is that, deep down inside, we ALL believe that we are above-average drivers.
5. There comes a time when you should stop expecting other people to make a big deal about your birthday. That time is: age 11.
via Kottke
Along with this spectacular photo of Victoria Falls, comes some marvelous writing by Michael Joseph Gross in Chasing the Ultimate Waterfall
Later I realized this was the reassurance of a waterfall. Here, our everyday elixir, the substance of which we are literally made, seems to be shattered, and immediately, perpetually, restores itself.
All the glory and excitement of this place, and of any waterfall, has just one natural purpose: it's the river's way of getting back to normal. A waterfall occurs at the rift between a stream's force and its path. It is simultaneously a mistake and a correction, existing in order to erase itself.
Blackfive has a patent-pending on the Irish palm pilot shown above.
It's worth pointing out that are two patron saints of Ireland, St Patrick and St. Brigid and the latter particularly loved beer which is featured prominently in some of the miracles attributed to her.
Her generosity in adult life was legendary: It was recorded that if she gave a drink of water to a thirsty stranger, the liquid turned into milk; when she sent a barrel of beer to one Christian community, it proved to satisfy 17 more. Many of the stories about her relate to the multiplication of food, including one that she changed her bath-water into beer to satisfy the thirst of an unexpected clergyman.
St. Brigid's prayer begins
I'd like to give a lake of beer to God.
I'd love the Heavenly
Host to be tippling there
For all eternity.
and ends
I'd sit with the men, the women of God
There by the lake of beer
We'd be drinking good health forever
And every drop would be a prayer.
Who else but an Irish saint imagines God as forever drinking beer, a beatific vision unique to the Irish?
Go here to hear Noirin Ni Riann recite the prayer in her wonderful Irish voice.
And finally, an Irish joke from To the Point.
An Irishman was walking along a beach in County Cork one day and noticed an encrusted bottle washed up on the sand. Wondering what might be inside he broke it off at the neck and out popped an Irish Genie.
"Oh, me man, I hah been in tha bottle for a hundred years, and you be settin' me free!" he exclaimed. "For that, I'll be givin' you two wishes!"
"Two wishes? Anything I want?" the man asked incredulously.
"Anythin' - just name it," the genie replied.
"Well, what I'll be wantin'," said the man, "is a glass of good Irish ale - but a very special glass, so that no matter how much I drink it will always be full of good Irish ale."
Poof! There it was in his hand. The Irishman drank and drank and drank, and twenty minutes later, he hadn't made a dent. The glass was still overflowing with wonderful Irish ale.
But by now the genie was getting impatient.
"Listen me man" he announced. "I'm grateful for you settin' me free, but I was in that bottle for a long time and I've things to do. So you'll be makin' your second wish now."
The Irishman thought for a moment, looked at the glass in his hand, and declared, "You know, I think I'll have another one of these!"
So drink and pray beer for St. Patrick and St. Brigid, but never green beer, an abomination.
There's a party over at Guinness. You have to register, but then you can download some Irish music by Quagmire
Speaking of procrastination, I had a grand time applying NCAA Tournament style brackets to bring the Final Four of Everything to where were you when moments, film deaths, ad slogans and marital arguments thanks to Slate's Enlightened Bracketologist.
You've probably heard somewhere from someone that there are more people alive today than have ever lived on earth before and assumed it was true.
The U.N. says we number 6.5 billion alive today.
Well Scientific American reports that 106 billion people have walked the earth before us.
The dead far outnumber the living.
Come Friday afternoon, it's time to start winding down.
So scoot on over to Billy Collins action poetry. The animations are wonderful.
Thanks to Patti who wrote I have died and gone to heaven.
I love what these eight-year-olds have to say about grandparents via Jim Selman at Serene Ambition where he ponders getting older
serenely.
• Grandparents are a lady and a man who have no little children of her own. They like other people's.
• A grandfather is a man grandmother.
• Grandparents don't have to do anything except be there when we come to see them. They are so old they shouldn't play hard or run. It is good if they drive us to the store and have lots of quarters for us.
• When they take us for walks, they slow down past things like pretty leaves and caterpillars.
• They show us and talk to us about the color of the flowers and also why we shouldn't step on cracks.
• They don't say, "Hurry up!"
• Usually grandmothers are fat, but not too fat to tie your shoes.
• They wear glasses and funny underwear.
• They can take their teeth and gums out.
• Grandparents don't have to be smart.
• They have to answer questions like, "Why isn't God married?" and "How come dogs chase cats?"
• When they read to us, they don't skip. They don't mind if we ask for the same story over again .
• Everybody should try to have a grandmother, especially if you don't have television, because they are the only grown ups who like to spend time with us.
• They know we should have snack-time before bedtime and they say prayers with us every time, and kiss us even when we've acted bad.
So I've been memed by Theresa at Technicalities.
1. My: What would I give my right arm for? If we're talking literally here, I'd give my right arm to save my life or someone else's if I'm feeling good. Otherwise, I'd give my right arm for someone to show me how to use Garage Band to edit audio tracks and how to record audio on my computer because I want to start podcasting because the BOOK is almost DONE and so is the SOFTWARE.
2. Me. What's one word that describes how you want people to see you?
Trusted.
3. Meme: If you could be any blogger, which blogger would you be and why?
Well, since Theresa has already picked Lileks, who I's sure is at the top of many lists, I'm going to go for The Anchoress. I just love how her religion informs her heart in her essays.
Three people who now can struggle with this meme. Ronni Miss Kelly, and Tish.
I can't believe how much time I spent today watching and reading all about Steve Job's presentation of the gorgeous iPhone with all its promise of beauty and elegance, power and magic.
Jobs got a standing ovation. iPhone drool shorted keyboards across the country.
I want one. Who doesn't?
Your very own eccentric British aristocratic title from Lady Fortune the Absurd of Greater Internetshire.
I had great fun, trying on different titles. My favorites are in red. Even more fun will be the first time I fill out an application using one of them.
Very Lady Jill the Larger of Goosnargh Leering
Honourable Lady Jill the Cosmopolitan of Pease Pottage
Her Royal Highness Jill the Erudite of Puddleston St Droop
Her Exalted Highness Duchess Jill the Pusillanimous of Lardle Midhoop
Her Noble Excellency Jill the Implacable of Nether Wombleshire
Entirely Miss Reverend Lady Jill the Excited of New Scagglethorpe
Her Exalted Highness Duchess Jill the Glutinous: of Kirkby Overblow
Her Eminence the Very Viscountess Jill the Purple of New Invention
Her Royal Highness Jill the Fortunate of Melbury Bubblewick
Venerable Lady Jill the Mad of Lower Slaughter
Entirely Miss Reverend Lady Jill the Confused of Featherstonehaugh St Fanshaw
Marchioness Jill the Assiduous of Giggleswick on the Naze
Her Most Noble Lady Jill the Incomplete of Porton Down
I am told that the motto on the shield "Fallentis semita vitae" comes from Horace and means the untrodden paths of life.