Holy crap this looks like a lot of fun!
It's like a Big Wheel for adults! Too bad about the freewheeling pedals though... Part of the charm of the Big Wheel was skidding to a stop with the front locked up and the ensuing flat spot you had to ride around with forever afterwards.
Well this is pretty cool...
A flying robot playing 'Jingle Bells' on a piano. For those of you that doubt, they threw in a clip at the end of 'Echo' (the robot) failing. Looks like it had a bit too much to drink...
Kinda puts my first robot, Steve, to shame....
Yeah, that is all Steve does. He sweeps across 180 degrees looking for the brightest light source and points at it. Not very useful except as proof that I could make and program something like that. I have some ideas for some cooler shiznet, but first I have to learn.
This morning it was snowing at the house... Since I was home (took the week off), I drove Carrie to the park and ride so she wouldn't have to worry 'bout the driving.
Good call by Mikey! Our neighborhood roads were white, but not too bad. We got on the freeway to go a mile or so up to the P&R and it was a disaster! A couple of cars in the ditch, and a few more facing the wrong way. The exit that we take was all but impassable as cars were strewn every which way. I bailed out as it would have taken just one more car loosing traction and it'd be blocked.
The next exit up the freeway was in better shape so we got off and headed back down South. There was a bus jack-knifed on the off-ramp. We decided to go to the P&R within walking distance of the house in case Carrie can't get a bus. When we got close, we crossed a line and, bam, the roads were no longer snow covered, just wet. I dropped her off, and within the 3/4 of a mile from the P&R, the roads were again snow covered and slick. Weird!
Word, this is what life is like in the PSCZ*, yo! We don't front!
I am SOOOOO sick of listening to people bitch that, should the Seahawks win next week, they don't deserve a playoff spot because of a losing record. They deserve a playoff spot because that is in the rule book. A division winner gets a home playoff game. Simple as that. Therefor, if they beat the Rams, they will be 4-2 in division play, and deserve their playoff spot.
Boo hoo, that's not fair!!!
Is it any more 'fair' if an OK team is in a division with three crappy teams giving them six easy wins?
In 2008 the Cardinals went to the playoffs with a 9-7 record, 6-0 in the division. That year the Rams were terrible (2-14) and so were the Seahawks (4-12, with two wins over the Rams). If either of those teams were at the level they are today, the Cards could have easily been 7-9 and still won the division. Oh yea, and they went to the Superbowl that year... Is that 'fair'?
Is it fair that the Seahawks typically travel the equal of a flight around the world every season (~25,000 miles) while some teams travel less than 10,000?
Life isn't fair, and sport is like life condensed into a one year season. Work hard, make the right choices, and being a good person is no guarantee that nothing but good will come to you. It sure helps your chances. There is alway the randomness of being in the right place at the right time.
Merry Christmas everyone! I present to you my present to you. (heh!) A physics lesson. Oh joy! Force = Mass x Acceleration, or in laymans terms the law of tonnage. The heavier they are, the harder they are to stop.
3,500lb Audi slides slowly into parked car, there is a bit of jostling. 35,000lb snow plow slides slowly into parked car, there is a whole bunch of jostling.
Here is an extreme case... Prolly the same speed, but the mass is way higher!
Skip to around 4:23 for the meat of the damage. As far as I can tell nobody was hurt. More here...
Again, Merry Christmas, I hope you are enjoying family and friends today.
Our tree for 2010... If I'm taking pictures like this, there isn't much need for Carrie to decorate. Look closely and you can tell where the red ribbon is.
I guess it really isn't epic, that just sounded good in the title. Anyhoo, Here I am, sitting in front of my laptop, sipping coffee, and thinking of my favorite Christmas music. Hell, why not share!
#6, "You're a Mean One, Mr. Grinch" by Dweezil and Ahmet Zappa.
BTW, Ahmet taught me how to dance.
#5, "Merry Christmas (I Don't Want to Fight Tonight)" by the Ramones
#4, "Christmas in Hollis" by Run DMC
#3, "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" by Bruce Springsteen
#2, "Christmas Wrapping" by the Waitresses
Bonus - as performed by the Donnas
Of course these all cower to the greatness that is Andy Williams singing "Happy Holiday/The Holiday Season"
He'll have a big fat pack, upon his back
Lot's of goodies for you and for me
So grab a peppermint stick, for old St Nick
Hang it from the Christmas Tree
Yeah!
Thinking about it, these aren't non-traditional, at least in my house...
While we are at it how about a little Streisand...
Uh, Babs, that last take was pretty good, but you know what would be better? Speed it up x6....
Sorry 'bout that last one. It could have been worse. I could have posted "Blue Christmas", "Hey Santa", or "Little St. Nick". Or this...
Merry Christmas all!
There won't be snow in Dagobah this Christmas time.....
Enjoy!
DV sounds a little different IMO...
From Joe Saward's Grand Prix Blog...
"...Alonso might have been wiser to wave congratulations at Petrov for a job well done, but instead he gesticulated rudely, which did nothing for his reputation as a good sportsman."
Petrov did nothing wrong, he was racing for position (and a job). He couldn't care less that Alonso needed to get past him to win the championship. Did Alonso think that because of his history with Renault that they should pull over and let him by? Probably.
Ever seen Jeff Goldblum and Jemaine Clement in the same room?
...for most of my talking to walls. Much less pressure as I only have 140 characters to get my point across, and I don't have to worry about punctuation.
My goal is to share what I find funny or interesting, not what I am doing at the moment or what the cat is doing (I don't have a cat... yet...)
BTW, having a nice homemade cobb salad tonight. Props to Carrie. And a beer.
Man, just finished 40 some laps of Monaco, and I am beat up. Using the my wheel and pedals I actually get pretty sweaty. (I typically don't sweat while gaming...) It is a workout, and I don't even have the force-feedback turned on.
Right now I am going through my first season on easy. I have the racing line turned on, full abs, traction control and an automatic transmission. For a bit of realism I am forcing myself to stay in the cockpit view. Good lord, you can hardly see anything when your eyes are only two feet off the road. Even tracks that I was familiar with from previous game are tough as the cars are so fast a brutal. Corners come at you like machine gun fire. Luckily, like in a real F1 race, you get a practice session before quali. It takes me quite a few laps to find the groove of the track. Monaco was especially tough, as going around Rascasse, you couldn't see a thing. I never really 'got it', but I was starting to get close at the end. The tracks without walls on the edge are much easier, as they are much more forgiving.
All in all, I love the game. Of course, I am a F1 fanatic... The graphics and sounds are great. The cars are very well modeled (the McLaren has the f-duct scoop on the nose, etc). I look forward to doing lots of laps when the weather goes completely south.
Oooohhh, and talking weather, they did a great job with that... When it rains, your vision is severely impaired. The cars throw up a huge mist, and you have drops all over your visor. Looks just like the in-car from TV.
Just got back from one of the best games that I have witnessed. Wow! Best part? Turning to Carrie while watching Leon Washington head bobbing to the music before the second half kickoff and saying, "If he runs this in our first born's middle name will be Leon". He ran it in. Second best, telling her if he ran in another, the first name will be Leon. Now, if we have a son, the kid will be named L.L.
Fantastic!
My voice hurts, by the way.
Oh, and Faith Hill is no Joan Jett. That 'Sunday Night Football' song is trash. This here is the stuff
Heh!
Mike has re-discovered comics, and this is one of my favorite strips at the moment. Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal
Let's see you do this in one take with cats...
OK Go's newest video White Knuckles.
Twelve dogs, twelve trainers, thirty eight buckets, two furniture movers, all kinds of furniture, one hundred twenty four takes, thirty of those complete, and one goat. Once again, OK Go does it the hard way which, in my opinion, makes it better. I'm gonna watch again.
By the way, do yourself a favor and click through to YouTube and watch full screen in 720p HD. You can thank me later.
[h/t Gizmodo]
Today was a good day. Why? The reasons are many. I got to sleep in to ten after another six day fifty-five hour plus work week that I should have called in sick two days, but didn't as we are slammed. I'm feeling the best I've felt all week. Today had 'football weather' meaning rainy and cloudy so I don't feel guilty for watching football all day. ...And I discovered the NFL RedZone TV channel.
If you are a NFL fan and/or have ADD, ti is the greatest thing in the world! Basically the RedZone shows all the interesting stuff that is going down in the league in realtime. If a team is in the red-zone threatening to score, they show it. A team trying to make a comeback late? They show it. Two games at interesting points? They split the screen and show it. Fantastic!
Basically, if the games that are available to you to watch are uninteresting, watch the RedZone. Chances are, something interesting is happening in a game somewhere.
Sadly, today was a free trial. But it was successful. I may have to make a call to my provider to see about getting it activated. I'd happily pay five bucks a month more for just that channnel. Unfortunately, they will probably want twenty because it is packaged with twenty other channels that I won't watch.
Happy Labor Day everyone! Haven't been posting much (or anything) lately as I have been pretty busy performing labor at work, if you can call mouse herding labor... Pretty much six tens for a while now. My work isn't physical, but I sure come home tired in the head. Anyways it has been really nice to have three days off with nothing planned. Enough of that, lets get on to stuff that has to do with the title...
For quite awhile I have dreamed of the perfect camper. I have no use for a big fancy motorhome or trailer that can't travel far off the pavement, I want something that can go almost anywhere. Today, while doing some web-surfing I think I found the perfect one. The XP Camper.
This here is my perfect camper. A few standout items that make me love it... The diesel appliances, no propane. It looks to be setup to go a long time being self contained with solar panels and 80 gallons of fresh water. It sits on a flat utility bed on the truck, which allows for more room, and more utility when the camper is off. It looks to be made with good marine quality fixtures. The only downfall I see is that it is pretty spendy for a fully outfitted camper, north of $70k w/ a kitted out flatbed installation. That does not include the truck. ...Always a catch. You can save 30k by buying a shell and kitting it out yourself.
Time to start saving!
...Not bad for a guy that hasn't written cursive in 25 years. Taken on Rialto beach in La Push, Washington.
One of my favorite football players of all time, and that was even before he played for the Seahawks. Congratulations on making the Hall of Fame. As you can tell from the picture, Randle liked the eye-black, and I am a little disappointed that the NFL didn't have it on his bust... Here is a video of him getting ready for the season.
Classic!
Look at that, two Seahawks in one Hall of Fame class! (snicker) John Randle, and Jerry Rice... Randle joins the other great Seahawk defensive HoFer Carl Eller (Hello Minnesota!).
The other Seahawk HoFers are Steve Largent, Warren Moon, and Franco Harris (heh, We get him in exchange for the 2006 Superbowl XL trophy). All joking aside, we get to claim Moon, as he has tight ties to here (Huskies, broadcasting), and the Oilers no longer exist.
A token post from me, as I realize it has been almost a a month.
Why?
Because I have been working hard to get in shape for winter.
How?
I'll let the picture do the talking...
Fast cars, fast women, cigarettes and beer!
Alonso's Renault return 'a mistake' - ESPN F1
Agreed... It's too bad that Alonso seeming can't function on a team where he isn't the clear number one. I think racing is most exciting when the teammates duke it out on the track (as long as it stays civilized). See McLaren and Red Bull (apart from Turkey).
I think Jenson is doing it perfectly. I have no doubts that he isn't laying down for Lewis, and if he gets beaten by Lewis he doesn't seem to be all 'pissy pants' about it. I don't think it is an act(if it is, he's a good actor). Lewis does alright with it, though you see little glimpses of frustration every once in awhile. Vettel and Webber look to have a good amount of friction between them, but neither seems to be running from it, Red Bull has signed Webber for another year.
On the flip-side, I can see how it makes sense to have a clear number one. Example, going into Turkey, if memory serves me correctly (to lazy to look it up), Jenson was leading the drivers championship. Since then, in each of the last three races, he has finished directly behind Lewis. Hypothetically, lets say the whole team, including Lewis, was working to win him the championship. Lewis would have let him have the position in Turkey, and somehow let him by in Canada and Valencia. Now instead of third place Vettel being 12 points behind Lewis for the championship, Vettel would be in second, 23 points behind Jenson. More cushion. Lewis would be third, 5 points behind Vettel.
Jenson button and race winner Lewis Hamilton celebrate after a 1-2 finish for McLaren in the 2010 Canadian GP
I'm slowly getting some photos up from my trip to the Canadian GP. Took over 2400, already deleted 400, a ton more to go!
For example, here is a screenshot from Adobe Lightroom of a small percentage of the pictures that I took of the McLaren MP4-25 race car of Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button...
Uhhh, as of right now I have over 450 of that car and most of them look the same. Eventually I'll have it down to around 10-20, but that will take awhile.
Anyways, Here is a link to my Flickr photostream for the event. As I weed out nice shots you'll see them there.
A little video from a gig...
Someone put a wallet in his mouth!
Carrie's boy... World champion dream-boat Jenson Button. Picture by ME!
Nothing like a little 'O Fortuna' and a smoke to get you ready to tackle the world!
Gonna have to talk to Carrie about filming me in the shower... I guess it doesn't help that I blog it.
Absolutely stunning footage. This packs just about everything that I find cool into one video. Snowboarding to gadgets to mooses (sic). That camera on the truck would make my commute look interesting!
Damn! I need an alarm that wakes me up with teh* funk! If this stuff doesn't get you moving, nothing will.
* - Nine out of ten 'teh's that I use are on purpose.
Heh! Good God!
I thinks he's back...
Mike is learning to dance. This here is step one. Step two? Buy headband, and clothes with fringes.
James Brown FTW!
‘Lost’ Finale: Best Show in Television History Comes to ‘The End’ Ben Shapiro, Big Hollywood
Agreed... 'Best show in television history'.
Though I disagree with this...
I was angry because I felt that the end of the show embodied a rather depressing underlying philosophy. At the end of the show, we find out that the alternate reality of Season 6 has in large part been a ruse. It wasn’t a different timeline created by Juliet’s nuke at the end of Season 5; it was a purgatory state created jointly by many of the Oceanic 815 survivors where they could find each other and remember their lives before passing to the next stage, presumably heaven.
The reason this was depressing is that you spend six years hoping for these characters to find happiness, only to realize that the only happiness they truly find comes after they’re dead. That may be comforting for some, but it depressed the living hell out of me.
A little hard to watch the first half, but the end is well worth it.
click through here if the embed isn't working.
More evidence that a Lab is the best dog in the world....
[h/t Ace of Spades
Let's cut to the chase, I loved the finale of Lost. The series ended just as it started, with a lot of questions. Some complain, but that is why I think it was so great. It wasn't your typical dumbed down television, here are all the answer so you don't have to use your brain and imagine....
Here is what I think...
...that it will be gone in 12,500 years.
Read 'On Being the Wrong Size' from Watts Up With That? by Willis Eschenbach.
The gist... (for those of you who only like 'clicky' enough to get this far...) Facts such as the title are worthless without scale.
If you read this article from the Grist (the gist from the Grist, I'll be here all day), it reports how much mass the Greenland ice cap is losing annually.
Scott Luthcke weighs Greenland -- every 10 days. And the island has been losing weight, an average of 183 gigatons (or 200 cubic kilometers) -- in ice -- annually during the past six years. That's one third the volume of water in Lake Erie every year.
...
The good news for Luthcke is that a separate team using an entirely different method has come up with measurements of Greenland's melting ice that, he says, are almost identical to his GRACE data. The bad news, of course, is that both sets of measurements make it all the more certain that Greenland's ice is melting faster than anyone expected.
Slammed VW's were the shiznit when I was in high school.... Never saw one this low.
Here a bean, there a bean
everywhere a mean bean
More Descendants
Everything sucks.
Here it is, the culmination of my weekend project. Franken-Bike.
I believe this thing has a part that has hung off of every mountain bike that I have owned except my newest (haven't upgraded anything on it yet). It all started with a '93 Stumpjumper M2. As far as I know, the only part in common with that bike is the purple Chris King headset. Later I cracked that frame and Specialized replaced it under warranty with the red one that I currently have. The front wheel with the Machine Tech hub and blue nipples, and Avid brake levers are from my second bike, an AMP B2. The pedals, crank, stem, bars, shifters and saddle are from my third bike, a '97(?) Specialized FSR Elite with a Manitou triple-crown fork. (can't find a picture).
This is gonna be my 'road' bike, as my current bike, while awesome on dirt, is miserable to to pedal on asphalt. I took a spin in the neighborhood this evening, and the thing scoots. On caveat, I have to watch out a lot smaller obstacles... I about went down rolling over a little half inch rock.
The Cayman Interseries: HSR, Road Atlanta from TangentVector on Vimeo.
Just started following Lebron's Elbow on Twitter. Hilarious! here are a few gems.
In the training room getting "loosened up". Lot of rubbing and oil involved. I'll be shocked if I make out here without getting pregnant.
12:54 PM May 3rd
Delonte West brought a guitar case to practice today. I almost crapped myself until he opened it and it was filled Gummie Bears.
about 7 hours ago
Bedtime. Not gunna lie I'm pretty bummed. So to cheer myself up I glued LeBron's head to his pillow.Read more...
about 21 hours ago
Cool (to me) video I came across while surfin' this evening....
Apollo 11 Saturn V Launch (HD) Camera E-8 from Mark Gray on Vimeo.
Taken two weeks ago. He sure loved that ball, and I did too, as it didn't have enough mass to break anything of consequence when he threw it (it happened quite a lot).
We miss you buddy!
Some say that his breath smells of magnesium, and that he's scared of bells...
All we know is, he's called the Stig.
Spotted near the original location of 'The Office'. (Dwight over Gareth FTW).
Not sure why Google takes down 'Stig' sightings on Maps. It makes me sad (see my Loch Ness post from January). That is why I took a screen clipping this time. My guess... money.
Here is the map of LegoLand... See if you can find more of him.
View Larger Map
Getting a lot of visitor reading my post on the loss of my good buddy Clyde the Labrador and was feeling a little embarassed about the shape of the backyard in the last video...
This is what it looked like pre-dog, and most of all pre-trees-that-grow-at-a-ridiculous-rate-and-blot-out-the-sun.
I'm gonna need a chainsaw to get back to that....
Carrie and headed out to see Conan O'Brien the night after Clyde passed away. It was good to laugh, though seeing video of his chocolate lab licking peanut butter off his foot (to pass time while he wasn't working) was a bit too soon... but still funny.
We were rewarded with this... Listen carefully and you can here me yell "woo!" when Mike McCready starts playing the lead in to one of the greatest songs ever.
Eddie Vedder and Mike McCready... SWEET!
Made me feel old though. I realized that for the predominantly twenty-something crowd this was probably the equal of Steve Winwood coming out and belting a rousing rendition of Bill Haley's 'Rock Around The Clock' when I was twenty four.
Sounded better where I was sitting, I didn't get so much horn.
Not the first time EV and MM have belted this. Here's PJ rocking it back in 1993. Stone is doing laps....
I have discovered where the term "hole in my heart" comes from... No joke I literally feel like there is a void under my rib cage. I always thought it was some sappy lovey-dovey thing for girls.
It is also a curse. Why? That damned Extreme song. (1:17 to cut to the chase)
Thanks a lot Clyde! :)
Our good buddy passed away this morning at 6:45. He will be greatly missed.
This all happened quite suddenly in the last thirty six hours, totally out of left field. To keep it short, he had a brain tumor that started showing slight signs (stumbling) on Wednesday, but quickly progressed between Friday evening and Sunday morning when he stopped breathing on his own. We were able to be at his side as he passed quickly without struggle.
We had way too little time with the Captain. May 5th would have been only the three year anniversary of us bringing him home. In that short amount of time he made a huge impression on us. Whether it being making us laugh, or pissing us off, every memory of him is a good one.
Take our try at organised training. Clyde barked constantly and just wanted to play with the other dog while the trainer was talking. When it was our turn to do the floor exercise he promptly dropped a duce in front of twenty other dogs and owners. Yeah, I believe everybody understood, but it is still embarrassing to picking up a turd while others are watching. Extremely stressful at the moment, very funny now.
We have a ton of stories like that.
He was a gentle soul that loved food, everybody that he met and water (in that order). He ate every meal like we hadn't fed him in weeks, met every person like he hadn't seen them in years (even strangers), and took to water like an otter. His favorite place was the Edmonds Dog Park on the Puget Sound. It could be thirty degrees out, and he would wade chest deep with his back to me, waiting to toss his bumper. I would try to keep him above, in the dry part of the park, but he would eventually bolt, and go in by himself. He loved to fetch his ball in the family room until it was annoying.
I am sure glad that I dragged out the P&S camera last weekend, and shot some video. I had no clue that it would be the last time. I put one up on this post, Clyde Going Ape, showing him in full freak out because we drove to the park. He was like a teenage girl going to see the Beatles.
Here he is on that same trip, doing his favorite thing, fetching his bumper out of the water....
And finally here is a video of Clyde and I playing in the backyard (while Carrie worked) the day before.
I love that at the end of the last video, he gives me a 'high-five'. Suspiciously it was much the same movement as his 'low-five' and the 'on-the-side'. The handshake was the same thing too. He would only do it with the proper paw.
Clyde was a special dog and in our short time with him he made our lives better. I would do the experience all over again exactly the same, no question, even knowing how it ends. He was our Pooper....
Clyde, buddy, we are really gonna miss you. Thank you for all the joy you added to our lives. Already I miss the incessant pawing at the back door to go out, only to change your mind when I opened the door, or paw to come back in ten seconds later after you just sniffed the air a couple time.
I'm going to miss my walking buddy, though my shoulder might not.
I sure wish you were here laying under my feet, bored, as you often did when I was sitting at the computer. 
Adios amigo, you were a great friend!
I wanna be sedated, by Gus and Fin...
Thanks guys, I needed that.
[h/t Serious Eats]
Lol, that IS pretty sad...
From the comments -
...Microwaves were introduced as the next big cooking device that could speed meal preparation and possibly replace conventional ovens. Today we associate them with boiling water, reheating leftovers or beverages and cooking frozen ready to eat meals.
Clyde gets a bit excited as we pull up to the dog park....
We did a good job burning off that energy. We've been home for 4 hours and all he has done is sleep. The bad news is, that means he will be getting his second wind jut about the time we head to bed.
Well, that sucks....
Good to see Three Sheets coming to the travel channel in HD. Carrie and I have been watching since the Mojo days. Zane travels the world showing us the local spirits, drinking customs, and hangover cures. Entertaining and educational. Check it out.
I hit the floor laughing when I saw this (happened to be drinking a beer, so that helped).
Create a caption: Whitehurst and beards - Seahawks Insider
Charlie Whitehurst...
Barry Gibb...
Hmmmm.....
Personally, I think Charlie Whitehurst is bizzaro Hasselbeck....
I Like Hasselbeck, and am a bit of a sentimental fan, so in solidarity, I shaved my winter beard... That and my fear of a 'beard tan'.
Oh yeah, and I was starting to look like they pulled me out of a 'spider hole'.
I am excited for the Whitehurst era (If there is an era, that means he was worth every cent...) and hope he does well (duh).
Quite an impressive! Like the finale of a good heavy metal show...
Volcano erupts near Eyjafjallajoekull in south Iceland - BBC News
An Icelandic volcano, dormant for 200 years, has erupted, ripping a 1km-long fissure in a field of ice.
The volcano near Eyjafjallajoekull glacier began to erupt just after midnight, sending lava a hundred metres high.
Icelandic airspace has been closed, flights diverted and roads closed. The eruption was about 120km (75 miles) east of the capital, Reykjavik.
...
There had initially been fears that the volcano could cause flooding, as it causes ice to melt on the glacier above it, but that scenario appears to have been avoided.
However, it could cause more activity nearby, scientists say.
"This was a rather small and peaceful eruption but we are concerned that it could trigger an eruption at the nearby Katla volcano, a vicious volcano that could cause both local and global damage," said Pall Einarsson, a geophysicist at the University of Iceland's Institute of Earth Science, Associated Press news agency reported.
A little rule that I like to live my life by... Don't eat crab spelled with a 'K'....
I'm sure it was just fine as the boats that probably caught said 'krab' were visible from their deck. It just makes me uncomfortable.
The big chief is now three years old! Getting a little grey beard, though in real life it is quite a bit less. The flash reflects off of the silver pretty strong.
Note - I use treats to get his attention. While it works good, it has it's side effects.... (look closely at #1, easy to spot in #2)
Heh, back when cartoon were great! Pretty sure I saw this as a kid (multiple times), pretty sure I didn't catch the humor in that line.
Play it loud, play it proud!
I'm trying to expand my musical horizons and I think I may have found the edge...
I like this one much better...
“Back in World War II, we viewed the Japanese as ‘yellow, slant-eyed dogs’ that believed in different gods. They were out to kill us because our way of living was different. We, in turn, wanted to annihilate them because they were different. Does that sound familiar, by any chance, to what’s going on today?”-Tom Hanks
Hanks apparently has confused the furor of combat — in which racial hatred often becomes a multiplier of emotion for the soldier in extremis — with some sort of grand collective national racial policy that led to and guided our conduct.Could an innately racist society go through the horror of Okinawa (around 50,000 Americans killed, wounded, or missing), then a few months later in Tokyo have MacArthur ensure a relatively peaceful transition to 'a rather radical new independent and autonomous democratic culture'? (Something that I think is usually overlooked, people stop reading at the signing of the surrender documents on the battleship Missouri)
In Hanks’ case, he is either ignorant and has done little real research, or in politically-correct fashion has taken a truth about combat in the Pacific (perceptions of cultural and racial difference often did intensify the savagery of combat) and turned it into The Truth about the origins and conduct of an entire war — apparently in smug expectation that such doctrinaire revisionism wins applause these days in the right places (though I doubt among the general public that he expects to watch the series.)
All in all, such moral equivalence (the Japanese and the U.S. were supposedly about the same in their hatreds) is quite sad, and yet another commentary on our postmodern society that is as ignorant about its own past as it is confused in its troubled present.(underline by me)
Clyde bellies up to the bar...
The dog with a hurt foot being mopey around new years time.
Slick video of what it would look like if you hung on for dear life to the nose gear of a 747. For kicks, the pilot then lowers the nose gear alone so you could see the aircraft clean. Beautiful!
Came across this while pounding through the Reader today. It is a book on the graphic design of race cars by Sven Voelker.
Most people don’t know that racing cars from the likes of Porsche and Ferrari were given their looks not by marketing strategists or designers, but by chance. Go Faster is a collection of over one hundred examples of racecar design that documents the carefree anarchy in which they were created. In the book, each colorful racing car is featured next to a blank, white model. Thanks to this juxtaposition, Go Faster shows its readers exactly how graphics modulate the look of the vehicle. The neutral models also give readers ample opportunity to imagine their own possibilities for graphic design in motor sports.
OK Go who first came to my attention with the amazingly simple (yet complex) video on YouTube for their song 'Here it Goes Again' (watch it again, it is genius), has released just released another video. No way could you describe this one as simple!
What a fabulous Rube Goldberg machine! My fav part... The TV.
Added bonus, it is embeddable, thanks in part to an open letter by Damian Kulash of OK Go. It is a good insight to the going ons of the modern music industry.
So, if you liked it, do like I'm going to do, once I repair the powercord to my desktop (Clyde) that has my music collection because I have yet to transfer it to my NAS so I can access it throughout my house... (deep breath) and by a song or two or a whole album of theirs.
Wow.
Gotta keep your head on a swivel when driving through a construction site...
If that were a real wrecking ball, that thing would have gone right through that car, barely slowing down. That and someone probably wouldn't have yelled "cut!" at 0:16.
A good read over at Big Hollywood on the Beastie Boys second album 'Paul's Boutique' by Cam Cannon.
As many of you know, and as many can guess (hint, my web site address, iammiked.com), I am a big B-boys fan. This is the album that started it all for me.
Way back, when I was in the ninth grade, the Beasties first album, 'License to Ill' was all the rage. "Fight for Your Right", "No Sleep 'till Brooklyn", "Paul Revere". Guys walking around with stolen VW logos around their neck. I hated it, thought it was sillyness. Since, I have learned to like it, but it isn't even in the top five of my favorite Bboy albums.
Then I saw this video...
Oh yeah, that's the stuff! The album was all over the place, and I mean that in a good way. You had '5-Piece Chicken Dinner' to 'Looking Down the Barrel of a Gun' to the 'Shake Your Rump' and everything in between.
My favorite was 'B-Boy Bouillabaisse', a collection of a bunch of shorts at the end. Here is a taste, 'A Year and a Day'
Nice time lapse by the YouTube poster BTW.
Many hours have been spent with this on eleven, and I see no end in sight.
Now, I'm off to mix the Bass Ale with the Guinness Stout out with the guys. Later!
500th post!!
Here we go again, the racist tag thrown around to belittle someone that you don't agree with. Yay journalism!
CPAC Speaker Bashes Obama, in Racial Tones by KATE ZERNIKE
How can conservatives win the youth vote that overwhelmingly went for Barack Obama in 2008? At the Conservative Political Action Conference, apparently, some are betting on using racial stereotypes.
In a panel appealing to conservatives under 30, Jason Mattera, author of a forthcoming book called “Obama Zombies: How the Liberal Machine Brainwashed My Generation,” likened the gathering to “our Woodstock.”
“Except that unlike the last gathering, our women are beautiful, we speak in complete sentences and our notion of freedom doesn’t consist of snorting cocaine,” he said, “which is certainly one thing that separates us from Barack Obama.”
[...]
He then mocked what he described, with a Chris Rock voice, as “diversity,” including, he said, college classes on “cyber feminism” and “what it means to be a feminist new black man.”
What can I say? This is almost as disgusting as Sarah Palin's VP campaign rallies.
[...]
Let's face it, there's no way around it,. the Republican Party is the old southern dixie-crat, un-repentent, segrationists in a new suit.
[...]
i know who rupaul and barney frank, but who's jason mattera? (i can safely guess i can continue not knowing who he is.)
These folks have no ideas, no policy proposals, no solutions, and they are left with all that they are good at - name calling - disgraceful!
Ad seen while mowing through my reader today -
I can't tell which one is the cartoon and which is real...
Vin, I kid, I kid!
View Round The World in a larger map
I'm still moving forward with my (simulated) flight around the world. It has slowed down a bit as I have been spending more time learning to fly a Cessna 185F Skywagon. That plane is a tail-dragger and I am having a tough time setting her down without bouncing back up a few times. Practice, practice.
Last night I landed in the Faroe Islands, a place that I didn't know about before I set out on this trip. From what I've seen, it looks like a place that I would like to visit in real life. Very beautiful, some amazing geography. Here is a little video to give you a taste...
Next hop will be to Iceland, not sure what airport yet.
BTW, the new map above should give you a little more information on the airports that I have landed at. Clicky.
BMW Oracle's USA-17 wins the America's Cup, bringing it back to the United States.
Why are we still being punished for Janet Jacksons nipple? C'mon, The Who was the oldest halftime show since George Burns and Mickey Rooney in 1987. Mickey Rooney was only a year older than Daltry. I believe George burns was 127 at the time.
Honestly, bringing back Up With People would be better.
Don't get me wrong, I love The Who but that was lame. It would have been better if they played one song than the medley thing. What, no Happy Jack?
This video is from a show two years before I was born, and I'm getting up there... (sidebar - I could watch Keith Moon play all day... )
I can't wait until Super Bowl LXIV when Pearl Jam takes the stage!
Eat your broccoli, drink your beer!
Over at the Washington Beer Blog I read some good news this morning.
Study Finds Beer is a Rich Source of Silicon, May Help Prevent Osteoporosis
A new study suggests that beer is a significant source of dietary silicon, a key ingredient for increasing bone mineral density. Researchers from the Department of Food Science & Technology at the University of California, Davis studied commercial beer production to determine the relationship between beer production methods and the resulting silicon content, concluding that beer is a rich source of dietary silicon.
...
Based on these findings, some studies suggest moderate beer consumption may help fight osteoporosis, a disease of the skeletal system characterized by low bone mass and deterioration of bone tissue.
...
The hop samples analyzed showed surprisingly high levels of silicon with as much as four times more silicon than is found in malt. However, hops are invariably used in a much smaller quantity than is grain. Highly hopped beers, however, would be expected to contain higher silicon levels.
“Beers containing high levels of malted barley and hops are richest in silicon,” concludes Dr. Bamforth. “Wheat contains less silicon than barley because it is the husk of the barley that is rich in this element. While most of the silicon remains in the husk during brewing, significant quantities of silicon nonetheless are extracted into wort and much of this survives into beer.”
Article: “Silicon in Beer and Brewing.” Troy R. Casey and Charles W. Bamforth. Journal of the Science of Food and Agriculture Published Online: February 8, 2010 (DOI: 10.1002/JSFA.3884); Print Issue Date: February 2010
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