Thursday, December 30, 2010

An Era Has Passed

Goodbye, easily-replaceable cog in an entertainment machine. In tribute, here is a song you may never have been in the studio for, plus completely unrelated visuals.

Wednesday, December 29, 2010

Yum Yum Good Eats

Gratuitous advertising: holy shit is Vij's a great place. Had the mushroom appetizer and the venison main, got to sample the yam appetizer and the eggplant and chickpea main. I don't go there often, but wow once again.

Monday, December 27, 2010

The View From Afar

Warner Todd Huston:
It has gotten so bad in France that in some parts of its cities, those parts controlled by marauding gangs of Muslim youths, whites never enter for fear of their lives. Not only that but not even police dare enter these areas. This dangerous situation does not seem anywhere near being solved. In fact, it’s just getting worse.
Well, fortunately modern technology allows us the means to check this out. Let us go then, you and I, while an evil crescent crosses the sky...



Closer...



Closer...



And on to street view, for the advertised unrest, NOW IN PROGRESS:

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Sunday, December 26, 2010

Death

Daniel Foster wants you to know that the president will kill you:
The stripping of the “death panels” from the final version of Obamacare won’t stop the administration from getting “end of life planning” into Medicare by other means.
You might think that "end of life planning" might have something to do with ordinary medical treatment like, say, weighing the benefits of extending your life for a year vs. spending most of that year hooked up to machines or taking poison intravenously, or, you know, at least letting patients and their loved ones know in advance what their prospects are. I think I am to read Mr. Foster otherwise.
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Conflict

To placate the maternal unit I went out with her on Christmas Eve to Jazz Vespers.

As church services go, it was better than most, and the jazz was as white as snow, which is okay at Christmas, the highlight being a version of the song embedded below (which I already like a LOT) with Jennifer Scott channeling Karen Carpenter. Yes, I mean that in a good way.

The United Church of Canada is pretty decent as decency goes, and the pastor was awfully gay (and happily married). Since candles and charity were involved, there were some firemen involved and he made some jokes about being handled by them, and the crowd had a whole bunch of happy folks being open about who they were; such a scene is good for mom, who once got awfully angry with me about the concept of gay marriage. It's also good for me: I muster up cringeworthy statements now and then, perhaps including this post. Still, bitter me at Xmas was thinking about the good feelings that the UCC is willing to extend to others in the pursuit of their mission being an expansion of the potential audience that can be lied to. The Baby Jesus story yet again moved me not in the least, but people holding hands in church who would, in my youth, have been beaten senseless for doing such a thing was a lesson. Mind you I haven't sat through an other-than-wedding service in many years, and it's Vancouver anyway, so who knows what's going on in those places? Bong and Bondage Vespers on the way soon? Bongdage Vespers?

And none of this good will prevented me from being the object of a creepy bathroom interrogation by a crazy guy wanting to know why I didn't go to church. Answering "IT IS CRAZY" did not seem to be right for the night, so "Merry Christmas" and I was out.

Saturday, December 25, 2010

Non-Parrot Entertainments

You probably saw this before I did:



Now consider the genius of Basil Wolverton:

Friday, December 24, 2010

Treasures of Archive.Org

One of my RSS feeds is a feed for the Internet Archive, which I mostly don't click through to. It's interesting to see the items go by, in a way: lotsa religious sermons, shitty dance tracks, and technical gobbledygook. Much like the internet as a whole I guess.

Well, it seems that the LaRouche maniacs also like to preserve video there. When I first saw LaRouche on TV he was an obvious nut buying late-night airtime, and his name is still synonymous with lunacy. If you watch the video, though, (or rather start watching it and never ever finish) how far is that lunacy from the lunacy of sitting Republicans? It's no different from Glenn Beck except that LaRouche dislikes some authoritarians - the focus on the British Empire remains absurd and hilarious - while Beck seems to like them all. Just how big an influence on right-wing memes is Lyndon LaRouche?



Note the tags:
economic; larouche; crash; econ; depression; recession; recovery; british; empire; world; 9/11; inside; job; defense; ego; president; obama; summers; modification; manipulation; sociology; swine; epedemic; pandemic; genocide; disease; pig; h1; n1; infection; sick; development; rail; power; nuclear; atom; fission; fusion; science; future; magnetic; levitation; looting co2; pollution; global; warming; epa; carbon; dioxide; climate; health; care; mri; ray; life; doctor; assisted; suicide; hospital; cut; payment; hmo; adam; smith; empiricism; religion; dogma; dollar; money; federal; reserve; usury; nazi; fascist; hitler; germany; england; british; king; adolf; kill; death; camp

Thursday, December 23, 2010

In the Absence of Posts

Go read this.

I am not sure how present I will be over the next while; maybe I'll be here more, maybe I'll be here less FEWER. In any case, enjoy what there is to enjoy and thank you very much for entertaining me.

Wednesday, December 22, 2010

The Itch That Must Be Scratched

Shorter Washington Times:
Know WHO ELSE took advantage of a lame-duck session?


HUGO

CHAVEZ.

Also Hitler did bad stuff.

And Mussolini.

Must-See Entertainment

News from one of the many places that pretends to be a kind of Hollywood:
Six people have been injured in an explosion on the set of the feature film Dungeon Siege II in a provincial park east of Vancouver.
The show must go on! Break a leg! Blow up in a propane-tank explosion! Et cetera! Please bring us Dungeon Siege II as the world is clamouring for it!

Who is heading up the crew of artistes endeavouring to bring us the finest in projectimacated pictures?
The film is being directed by Uwe Boll and stars Swedish actor Dolph Lundgren, who was last seen in the film the Expendables.
World, you owe us for cradling this soon-to-be masterpiece. Kiwis can EAT IT: WE IMPORTED BOLL.

Tuesday, December 21, 2010

Riverdale Sucks Too



Archie gets disappointed and Reggie’s an asshole again:
When Archie Andrews and Reggie Mantle are opponents in the race for student body president, each candidate channels one of the most well-known figures in American politics: Archie goes blue with Obama while Reggie goes red for Palin. Soon the real life politicians visit the young politicians.

Monday, December 20, 2010

Food of the Clods

Not merely the love of one foodstuff but the animal instinct, the simple undifferentiated hunger; that was the force that would tear the Party to pieces. She put the chocolate chips down upon the graham crackers, among the fallen marshmallows. Presently the melting and dripping of the sugary goop quickened, and in a sort of pleasant ooziness they slid askew. The sun seemed to have grown hotter. They were all ravenous. Almost immediately they ate and ate for about half an hour. Sarah finished first. You could not have pure hunger or pure indulgence nowadays. No emotion was pure, because everything was mixed up with fear and hatred. Their meal had been a battle, the dessert a victory. It was a blow struck against the Party. It was a political act.

No Eskate



I was never a good skater because I couldn't twist the blades around to catch the dark matter just so.

Sunday, December 19, 2010

Geek Notes

Holy cow is Foswiki ever a slick little package. I wrestled with TWiki some years ago and although it seemed like an obvious powerhouse it was tough for impatient me to make it do what I wanted quickly. Since TWiki lost a bunch of developers it forked into Foswiki and I get a nice little installer for my Mac. I'll be taking the Foswiki-enabled machine to a meeting or two I think, and maybe I'll get some adoptions happening.

Saturday, December 18, 2010

Joy

You must already have seen this parrot, yet I am reposting the video. It makes me laugh every time I see it. Do not seek out the original song: it sucks.



One, nothing wrong with me
Two, nothing wrong with me
Three, nothing wrong with me
Four, nothing wrong with me

One, something's got to give
Two, something's got to give
Three, something's got to give
Now!

Let the bodies hit the floor
Let the bodies hit the floor
Let the bodies hit the floor

Also:



And in comments for that, a truth is spoken:

Bye Bugs!

It seems I will not have to use my fabulous wealth to destroy art after all.
Rain was beginning to destroy the art because it was seeping into the piece where the Plexiglas had been smashed, Blume said.
Um, no. It was fogging up before the first removal.

The Underworld

Michael Steele can go to hell:
Michigan committeeman Saul Anuzis also announced a key endorsement Friday [in the race to chair the Republican National Committee] from Bill Crocker, the national committeeman from Texas.

Crocker joins Virginia committeeman Morton Blackwell in backing Anuzis; both are prominent conservative voices within the RNC.

Anuzis now has nine RNC members publicly committing to support him for chairman.
Mr. Anuzis pictured below:

Friday, December 17, 2010

Freedom

Via Morbo at Edroso's a too-filled-with-in-jokes parody of Marvel's Civil War bullshit.



I say "too filled with in-jokes" because I wish everyone on the planet could find this as hilariously funny as I do, but that's unlikely unless you've wasted an enormous amount of time on nonsense. I mean, presumably the other people on the planet are probably doing something more important like laundry, watching television, starving or what have you.

To make this post more useful then, consider reading this very very long comic or other more valuable things with the Firefox extension Linky, which'll open up every damned image in one tab if you ask it to, and then you can just scroll away. Linky's awfully handy for things like opening up, say, thirty tabs at once and then you just close 'em as you read. Hey, there's a Chrome version too.

Thursday, December 16, 2010

Good News Everyone!

Conrad Black:
By the time of the pope’s British trip, the swords of the worldwide Catholic-baiters had already been blunted by the sudden surge of alarm over the Gulf of Mexico oil spill. For several months, War of the Worlds horrors of the destruction of the world’s oceans, the end of the shrimp industry, the irreversible sliming of the entire Gulf and Atlantic coastlines of America, had shouldered and bullied into the back of the public mind the cherished prospect of the exposure of the Roman Church as a racket of pedophiles and predatory Sodomites. Of course, the oil spill was a terribly serious problem too. But in the one case as in the other, there was a determined effort, halting at first, hampered by bumbling and by an urge to downplay and deny, but soon indomitably determined and focused, to address the causes of the problem and stop it, and then to put things right as much and as quickly as possible and prevent repetition. It is not obvious why the swift and dramatic progress in both crises came as such a surprise, and to many, even apparently, as a disappointment.
That's right friends, the priest abuse scandals are over.

I encourage you to read Black's full column because I'm mean that way.

Wednesday, December 15, 2010

The Vicious Bloodlust of Moderate Centrism

Ross Douthat:
Hitchens is absolutely right that paranoia can lead to disastrous follies, and crackpottery to violence. But do you know what else has often led to folly, disaster, violence and human misery? The “moderation” and “centrism” of the Western governing class. It wasn’t Glenn Beck who mired the United States in two neverending overseas occupations, where “gun brandishing” is the least of the everyday horrors that flow from our policy failures.
On the one hand I wish to LOL at Ross Douthat and on the other, um, well done moderate centrists.

Tuesday, December 14, 2010

Why We Goatse

Mike Potemra:
I am very taken with his idea of the Internet as a metaphor for God; the Internet is, after all, a purely spiritual realm, using rudimentary material elements to connect souls with each other — sometimes across vast distances — in the communion of shared meaning.
Imagine a lone hand, and another lone hand, joined together by the flexibility of a gaping anus.

Two Things

A good thread at Sadly, No!

A sad little story condensed by Brendan.

Monday, December 13, 2010

The Fruits of Leftist Hollywood

The countdown has started. No less a man than John Nolte is getting ready to reveal his list of the best movies leftists have ever made. Given that Hollywood is a place where a conservative never gets an even break, this should give us a helluva big pool of fucking great movies, right? I mean, even with the stipulation that these have to be blatantly political - sorry 1,001 Ways to Eat My Jizz! - movies have been coming out of the LA area for, what, twenty or thirty years now or something right? And other people make movies too!

NUMBER 25!



And there we are! A thrilling and convincing tale of global warming ushering in a new ice age, with the not-crazy Quaid as humorless scientist with a cockamamie theory that JUST HAPPENS TO BE TRUE, YOU FATCATS IN WASHINGTON!
...in 2004 Emmerich let loose with “The Day After Tomorrow,” a Leftist snuff fantasy and environmental wet dream where all of Western Civilization, most especially the United States, reaps what they’ve sewn when Mother Nature strikes back for our polluting ways with a can of CGI Whup-Ass that contains super-tornadoes, tidal waves, and insta-freeze hurricanes that all lead up to another Ice Age.
That Western Civilization can sew up a Doily of Destruction is ably shown in the source material, The Coming Global Superstorm written by notorious leftist and skeptic Art Bell in conjunction with alien-ass-rape-victim Whitley Strieber. My great relief that the expression of the scientificamal facts contained in the book made it to the screen untainted by Hollywood's usual sentimental guff can only be expressed in a big wet sloppy blowjob to my hero Al Gore.

Be Good Tanyas - Broken Telephone

This always jumps out at me when I hear it. I think it's the vibrato of the voice and how far it is above the music. It's also nice that she slurs so much you don't have to pay too much attention to the lyrics. Could do without the reverb guitar.

Sunday, December 12, 2010

Good Will to Men

What says generosity, kindness, and the spirit of brotherhood in that special season?
You can give Burt’s latest hardcover collection of interviews, Portraits of Success for just $30! Or maybe you’d prefer his collection of commentary, Liberals, America’s Termites for just $20 postpaid. How about both for the rock-bottom price of just $40?
It's a wonder Burt doesn't include termite-destroying cans of Holiday Raid in the deal.

TinyPic Has Judged!

Oh the shame:

Leaky Art Syndrome

Here is some art I hate:



Someone's stolen a second mildly battered VW bug from it; good for them. The humidity and rainfall are such that the display cases are getting moist and gross. Truly the kind of problem unique to Vancouver.

If I win the lottery I pledge to buy a VW bug and smash it into the thing, bringing it down once and for all in a far more poetic way than it deserves.

Saturday, December 11, 2010

Christmas Gifts




Friends, I believe we are adult enough that I can admit to whacking off every once in a while. Let me now and forever promise not to rub your noses in it.*

*In the sense of not purchasing beatoff-celebration cologne only.

Light Sails

Will the day of the light sail soon be upon us? The diagram is interesting as it more clearly shows use of light flowing through the sail rather than being trapped by it.

MORE SCIENCE!




UPDATE!!

I have been called out.

EAT THIS, DOUBTER!

Friday, December 10, 2010

Free Stuff

Noticed some animation freebies, downloaded them.

Bryce for Windows here.
Bryce for Mac here.

Thus far I have learned that I can make water, land, and a tree. A pencil will do that too I guess.

Bryce let me know that Daz Studio was free. Well, it kind of is, partially. Some of what works when you download it will be crippled in 30 days unless you pay up. Downloaded it anyway. "Free" means two things in this case: register on their site to get the serial number (which will keep the core app going apparently, but the 30-day time limit on the other junk still holds) and the license also says I have to tell people about it. That's an easy thing to do, so I'm doing it.

Daz for Windows.
Daz for Mac.

For what it's worth - and I haven't gone too far into them yet - both programs above are way easier than Blender. Not that I've actually animated anything yet.

BOOTS STAMPING ON FACES FOREVER!

I understand that the New York Post is scratchy asswipe with a sports section, but come on:



That is just...doubleplusungood.

Play Count

Somehow the network drive lost my iTunes library file so I found an old one, used that, and imported - once again - every goddamned file I have. Top ten in terms of play counts not including a couple of thousand other songs:

Cow The Melvins 586
On Suicide Art Bears 219
La Migra (Cruza La Frontera II) Brujeria 191
I Get Wet Andrew W. K. 165
An Ending (Ascent) Brian Eno With Daniel Lanois & Roger Eno 140
Pandemonium Killing Joke 120
Mouth for War Pantera 103
Fucking Hostile Pantera 103
Cotton Bolls Killdozer 96
Guilty Of Being White Slayer 79

Apparently I like loud music unless it's about suicide and then I like weird music just as much. Also: I am a big fascist or something. The Melvins piece at the top is kind of a cheat: the song's okay, but it ends with two-and-a-half minutes of heavy trudging drums and I can listen to that forever, so I set the file to start at the drum solo. And then listen for a respectable proportion of forever.*



*To an eight-year-old.

Thursday, December 9, 2010

Baltimore What?

Orly!

Gee, I Dunno...

Sarah Palin:
Palin also talked about how frustrated she was with the continuing interest in that 2008 [Katie Couric] interview. “Because of that one episode, that one episode, that would turn an issue into what it has become over the last two years. I think that’s ridiculous,” she said. “That’s one of those things, where that issue … that I don’t read, or that I’m not informed, it’s one of those questions where I like to turn that around and ask the reporters, ‘Why would it be that there is that perception that I don’t read?’”
Smart!

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Also.

The Beast With Two Backsides

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Exploring the Z axis, if you know what I mean. Also the influence of that one Kraftwerk video.

Somehow TinyPic accepted our last excrescence so we'll see how this one does.

Wednesday, December 8, 2010

Wholesale Post Theft

This lifted from Susan of Texas:



There's something about the shade of blue Twitter employs that makes it perfect for clueless babbling. I may have to get me an account.

Hippies

Tuesday, December 7, 2010

She's Breaking Up!

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Father Forgive Them

Well I laughed:
St. John's Shrewsbury, built in 1858 and the last remaining building of a village that vanished decades ago, was an Anglican Church until Saturday.

Shortly before noon that day in what is now part of the municipality of Gore, St. John's was deconsecrated in a ceremony that also involved the sprinkling of holy water in its cemetery to cleanse the grounds of all traces of "the craft of Satan" or human malice.

Witches, waves of misguided ghost-hunters and self-proclaimed spiritualists, along with common vandals, have swarmed the church in recent years.
Okay, let's take a little break before the punchline.



We're back!
"This is the only church that I know of that has been brought to its knees by people ... pursuing some sort of desire for supernatural experiences," Archdeacon Edward Simonton said during the deconsecration service. "We could not protect this building."

Monday, December 6, 2010

More Moneyblogging

Here is a newish Canadian twenty, with our beloved Queen on the front, well-printed thanks perhaps to the beneficent influence of our betters:



Hey, what about those holograms down the one side?



There they are. Those are nice and all but the human warmth of this money is best displayed by the...GAAAH!



Little worms all over the face of Her Highness! And her beauty is obscured by petty numbers! Peeking through the other side - ignore the other art as it's not interesting in comparison - there's a little recompense as we have a ghostly Queen peeking through the other side:



What a relief. And we can get an even closer view of her luminous beauty here, only partially marred by worm damage:



What a delightful, respectable - and attractive! - woman. Excuse me, I have developed a strong urge to put Lyndon LaRouche in prison.

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Shovel-Ready Projects

Via Mr. Atrios:
A significant production problem with new high-tech $100 bills has caused government printers to shut down production of the new notes and to quarantine more than one billion of the bills in huge vaults in Fort Worth, Texas and Washington, DC, CNBC has learned.

[...]

Because officials don’t know how many of the 1.1 billion bills include the flaw, they have to hold them in the massive vaults until they are able to develop a mechanized system that can sort out the usable bills from the defects.

Sorting such a huge quantity of bills by hand, the officials estimate, could take between 20 and 30 years.
How tragic if actual people were hired to sort that out.

Sunday, December 5, 2010

Too Much for TinyPic? You Be The Judge!

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My friends, I have had one beer.

UPDATE: BEAUTY RESTORED

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Muslims In Spaaaaaaaaace

Here's an odd story:
MONTREAL - The head of the Muhammad Institute for Space Science, dedicated to putting the Islamic world back at the forefront of scientific discovery, wants to build a space-launch facility in Canada.

Redouane Al Fakir's goal has been to return Muslims to the place of pride they held, centuries ago, as world leaders in astronomy.

But the Vancouver astrophysicist wants all Canadians to be involved in his project. His proposed commercial space port would be the first of its kind in this country — and Al Fakir says it's about time.

The way he sees it, if countries like India, China and Japan can launch satellites into space, why not Canada?
He wants the launch site for the Muslim world to be here in BC somewhere. I'm of course for such a crazy arrangement but why wouldn't The World's Only Muslim Launch Site be in a country with a dominant Muslim culture? Whoops, prayer call, gotta go.

Saturday, December 4, 2010

What Makes This Funny?

Over at a Breitbart site someone watches this video:



The endorsement:
One of my favorite Saturday Night Live skits ever. I have not laughed this much in years.
What makes this funny if you're one of Breitbart's loons?

We Are All Pixels Now

Over at Gnoetry Daily a chatbot is about to be trained with Gertrude Stein as a model. I remember fooling around with these a few years ago: some folks thought you could use them as automated sales agents or FAQs, which is a remarkably efficient way to hide useful information. Still, they can be an entertaining alternative to the Monty Python argument sketch.

Friday, December 3, 2010

Ambition

Via Boing Boing, a video:



This sentence, apart from its scale I guess, is a triumph of theoretical chindōgu:



Thursday, December 2, 2010

One, Two, Three, What Are We Fighting For?

Mike Potemra writes about Sarah Palin:
So she may decide to settle for being a beloved, world-historical figure like TR, and leave the presidency to lesser men (or women!). But there was another politician who faced a similar choice, four years ago: I could be content with the adoring crowds, the bestselling books, the ideological media applauding my every move — or I could go for the presidency. We all know the choice Barack Obama made; and I somehow don’t think — all “quitter” gibes to the contrary — that Sarah Palin has any less fight in her than her fellow basketball player in the Oval Office.
Maybe, but are they playing the same game for the same prize? (Sarah Palin as a "world-historical figure like TR" is a smidge of overreach, imagining she did something in "the world" and all.)

Americans, face your future presiden- BZZZZ the alarm goes off and Mike Potemra wakes up.

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Wednesday, December 1, 2010

Germans

I have the sniffles. I am drinking juice and watching this: