- Happy Star Wars Day?! -a great day to debut some new ads we did – Will’s posterous – Like last year’s posters, these are a lot of fun.
- “– And Remove All Doubt” – DORK TOWER, Monday, May 10, 2010
- RNC Baselessly Attacks Kagan for Quoting Justice Marshall – With a nice list of constitutional amendments explicitly called for by the GOP in their current party platform. If it’s not defective, why try and fix it?
- Opposition off to a weak start – Wow. These are, indeed, pretty stupid arguments against Kagan (who, to be fair, has had much more substantive arguments leveled against her by folks to the Left).
- Google’s Android devices now outselling Apple iPhones?: Boy Genius
- GOP attacks Kagan by defending slavery. Seriously. – Bottom line, of course it’s defective — that’s why we have the various amendments to it since then, including the initial ten, but extending to such trivial things as slavery, women’s suffrage, and a variety of others (including some proposed in recent years by the GOP). To consider the US Constitution perfect, i.e., without defect at passage, is not only a slap in the face to those who benefited from all those amendments, but to commit idolatry.
- Barrasso Pledges To Make The Constitutionality Of Health Care A Major Issue In Kagan’s Confirmation Hearings – It’s certainly appropriate to ask a SCOTUS nominee their general philosophy on constitutional issues. Specifics about specific cases that may come before the court are inappropriate, because much depends, rightly, on how the cases are actually presented and argued.
- National Journal Magazine – Do ‘Family Values’ Weaken Families? – “In red America, families form adults [getting married and having kids causes you to grow up]; in blue America, adults form families [families are formed by people who have already grown up].” An overgeneralization, but with some statistical foundation and some very sobering implications as to what “family values” means in the red vs. blue states. Good article.
- Elfquest movie inches closer to actual existence – I have to confess I’d have been a lot more excited about this, oh, two decades ago.
Category: Star Wars
Unblogged Bits (Fri. 7-May-10 0200)
- VOTD: The Star Wars Trilogy Retold Using LEGO in 2 Minutes | /Film – Awesome.
- On Hold – The constitution calls for the Senate to “advise and consent.” I don’t see “obstruct, delay, stall, blackmail, and/or anonymously block” in there …
- McCain Caught Fundraising With Business Group That Killed McCain-Feingold, Shouts ‘I Love The Chamber!’ – McCain continues to spiral down into everything he once seemed to oppose. Very sad.
- Conservatives Discover One Right Accused Terrorists Should Have | The New Republic – They shouldn’t get legal representation, they shouldn’t be protected against self-incrimination … but don’t you dare take anyone’s guns away!
- Who’s to blame for Times Square? According to Obama, Obama is – So according to Bryan Fischer of the AFA, the Times Square bombing is all Obama’s fault because (a) Obama has been making people hate George W. Bush, (b) Obama has been attacking Pakistanis with Predator drones, and (c) Obama hasn’t been torturing detainees at Gitmo. Got it. Glad we have that settled.
- FRC Statement on Dr. George Rekers – Consider yourself officially thrown under the bus, George.
- Random Book Blogging: God Destroyed New Orleans With Katrina To Show Gays He Loves Them – Oh my word — the zaniness in this book excerpt (“The origins of Mardi Gras come from the fertility festival of Lupercalia, which has direct roots to Baal worship”) is truly awe-inspiring.
Unblogged Bits (Tue. 27-Apr-10 2000)
- The Slave Leia Car Wash Company – For a worthy cause … a very … worthy … cause …
- A Many-Splendored Thing – SMBC April 27, 2010
- slacktivist: Growing grapes at 11,000 feet – And yet they clothe themselves in religious righteousness on a regular basis.
- OverREACTing: Dissecting the Gizmodo Warrant – Looking at the itemized receipt, they seized his business cards ? Crazy. And, as noted, the search was pretty much illegal.
- Google’s Andy Rubin on Everything Android – Bits Blog – NYTimes.com – “Open usually wins.” Nice to think so, at least.
- TF: Down to earth – You can believe the Bible or not, as you choose. But don’t believe that the “Left Behind” books are, in fact, Biblical.
Unblogged Bits for Thu, 22 Apr 2010, 2:01AM
- Leonard Nimoy Retiring, Won’t Star in ‘Trek’ Sequel – I’ve very much enjoyed the voice-overs he’s done for Star Trek Online.
- Dem. Sen. Carper: Dems should drop areas of disagreement from Wall St. reform bill – So the way to move forward is to let the minority dictate to the majority what should or shouldn’t be in a bill. Um … right.
- Price of Ignoring ToS Details: Your Soul – Not at all surprising. What percentage of people (my guess: low single digits) actually read all the EULA information during an installation? (And, no, I don’t, either.)
- Facebook Used To Make Partners Delete Your Data After 24 Hrs. No Longer. – I don’t have anything on Facebook that worries me, and I decline to join in any games or applications that want to access my profile. That said, I’d never dream of making it my primary social platform.
- Glenn Beck, the IMF, and the “Global V-A-T” “prison” conspiracy | Media Matters for America – The Rodeo Clown meets Global Financial Policy. Hilarity ensues.
- Pope Urban Novak II – Right! We must protect the site of the Sermon on the Mount, and act as Blessed Peacemakers by BOMBING THE SNOT OUT OF IRAN! Just like Jesus would do!
- Army considers rescinding invitation to evangelist – Yahoo! News – It’s highly inappropriate to invite a speaker to the Pentagon who refers to Islam as “a very evil and wicked religion” — not least of which because (a) Muslims serve in the military, and (b) we have military posted in (and ostensibly in service to the people of) Muslim countries. That’s not censorship — that’s common sense. (Plus: why the hell does the Pentagon have a guest speaker for the National Day of Prayer in the first place?)
- Jeffrey Scott Shapiro is on a mission to rehabilitate George W. Bush’s reputation. – By Jordan Michael Smith – Slate Magazine – Money quote of Mr Scott: “Bush is clearly very smart. And you don’t need to be a genius to be president — you need good leadership skills and good instincts.”
- Barbershop Ewoks – I love Barbershop. I love Star Wars. I love … well, I appreciate Star Wars Barbershop.
Unblogged Bits for Thu, 1 Apr 2010, 8:01PM
- YouTube – Critique-Info.com – The A-Team (Trailer 2 [HD]) Bande-annonce 2 [HD] – I hope the movie sure has more gags and action than we see here, because (a) it sure seems to show a lot, and (b) it sure looks FUN.
- It’s Confederate History Month In Griffin, Georgia – “Oh, yeah, and the struggle to own whatever personal property we want, no matter how human-like it might appear.”
- Call The Number On A RNC Mailer And Hear “We Love Sex As Much As You Do” – Chortling like crazy here.
- Making Light: As the lighthouse said to the aircraft carrier – Obi-Wan: That’s no moon … it’s a space station!
Han: It’s too big to be a space station!
Luke: I have a very bad feeling about this.
Han: Screw it, I’m opening fire anyway … - Introducing the Mozilla State of the Internet Report – Interesting report. Plus … 600 Tabs??!! Yikes! (On the other hand, can’t believe the average is just 2-3, either, though I admit my current 36 is well to the fringe of the bell curve.)
- US Navy frigate exchanges fire with pirates, captures 5, near the Seychelles – chicagotribune.com – And the moral of the story is: The US Navy is relatively humorless, but quite effective, in responding to your near-sighted and/or poorly judged displays of gun-firing bravado.
- Official Google Blog: A different kind of company name – I love Google. Er, Topeka.
- Grunt, Woof and Moo to you too: Lawrence Chang
- Today’s vowel outage: The Gmail Team
Unblogged Bits for Wed, 24 Mar 2010, 8:01PM
- Palin Puts Gun Sights On “Target” Map; Urges We “Reload” – Again with the targets and crosshairs and shooting/hunting rhetoric. But, of course, when someone gets actually shot, it will all be claimed to be “harmless” words.
- Han Solo Gets the Final Piece of the Puzzle – Ha!
- The Complete Guide to Fixing Google Contacts (Lifehacker) – Noted for future use.
- GoDaddy.com plans to stop registering domain names in China – washingtonpost.com – Good for them!
- Caller To Rep. Bart Stupak: “You Baby-Killing Mother F***er…I Hope You Bleed Out Your A** Get Cancer And Die” – “And they’ll know we are Christians by our love.”
- The 17 Most Unintentionally Hilarious Propaganda Posters | Cracked.com – I actually sort of like the UK one. And then there’s the one that makes me think of a really creepy “Doctor Who” episode …
- Cornyn Flip Flops On Whether He’s ‘Interested In Repealing’ Popular Parts Of Health Reform – I’m more than happy to sit back and watch the internecine struggle on the Right amongst ideologues and pragmatists as to whether the GOP should push to repeal the whole bill (thus coming out against some increasingly popular provisions that even they like and have suggested) or just parts of the bill (in which case folks who’ve been screaming about the Obamacolypse either looks stupid or betrayed or both).
- Lawmakers backing off harsh punishments for sexting teens – I think the “OMG I can’t believe I was so freaking stupid only a few years ago” punishment for this sort of thing would more than suffice.
- Science Says High-Fructose Corn Syrup Is Pretty Much The Worst Thing Ever – Not to mention recent studies indicating the kidney problems it causes …
- The Opposite of Fitts’ Law – I love GMail’s power, its utility, its continuing parade of clever features. But its user interface is really awful, both for obvious reasons and for the more important ones noted here. (That’s true for most of Google’s products, too, including my beloved Google Reader …)
- Targeting Gays, Oklahoma Senate Mistakenly Strips Hate Crimes Protections For Race and Religion – They’re not only bigots, they’re incompetent bigots.
- Entering the ‘taking-credit’ phase – Wow. So, does he support repealing those parts he’s taking credit for, too?
- Opposing the ideas they support — mandate edition – Of course, the premise that there’s an actual rational basis for the repeal movement, vs. political opportunism and demagoguery, is pretty questionable. You don’t have to be consistent as long as you’re shouting loudly, I guess.
- Worst. Smear. Ever. – “Worst” as in “most inept.”
- Brownout – I can’t see Brown surviving his next election. The Dems will have a decent (and non-imaginary) opponent, and the Far Right has already written him off as a RINO.
- Wiley Drake Pretty Much Wants Everyone To Die – What I find second-most-bizarre is that Drake only thinks his prayers will work if he can personally identify folks by name (his God, I guess, doesn’t use wildcards).
- March 21, 2010: A Day That Will Live In Infamy – Money graf: “You know, it really is amazing that comparing Democrats to terrorists and traitors and Nazis has become so common among the Right that nobody even bats an eye any more.”
- Republicans Block Senate Committee Hearings, Including On National Security Matters, For Second Day In A Row – Remember this, the next time the GOP accuses the Democrats of being soft on Defense and National Security. Idjits.
- slacktivist: Glenn Beck Bingo – A nice look at Beck’s “912” values … and an amusing game for the whole family!
Unblogged Bits for Wed, 24 Mar 2010, 12:11PM
- HCR – Big Fing Deal! Tee Shirts from Zazzle.com – Apparently there are quite a few shirts, bumper stickers, and coffee mugs available to honor the Vice President’s comment. Heh.
- CampusProgress.org | By the Numbers: Student Loan Company Lobbying – If they have that much money to lobby with, then clearly they’re making huge profits with our taxpayer money (and from our needy students). I really don’t see a reason why my taxes should go to someone using my tax money to lobby to protect their profits from my taxes.
- Stupak receives death threats after voting for health reform. – So how is it that ostensibly “pro-life” people are issuing death threats? Yeesh.
- Sen. Barrasso Apologizes For Falsely Claiming House Member Voted For Health Care To Secure Judgeship: Igor
- Work with Care: OSHA brings worker fatalities to its homepage [Collective Imagination] – I don’t think it’s morbid — I think it’s an excellent reminder that safety isn’t about statistics, but about actual lives lost (or saved).
- Tea Partier Gives Out Congressman’s Address, A Wrong One, And Won’t Change It – Because it’s more important to be Angry than Accurate!
- Disneylands’ Swiss Family Robinson treehouse construction photos – Very cool.
- Secret ACTA fights over iPod border-searches – Remember that Big Media will pressure the government to allow them access to anyone and anything, anywhere, if they think it will help curb “piracy” (and/or protect their profits). Do you really want border guards searching your iPod, your computer, your thumb drives, your camera chips, etc.? Do you really think they don’t want just that thing?
- Steampunk Star Wars costumes – Very cool.
- What Lillian did in the war… – These women were heroes of “the Greatest Generation,” too. It’s a shame that their recognition has been so slow in coming.
- Bringing Lots of Liquids on a Plane at Schiphol – Having gone through security and duty-free at Schiphol (and having a bottle of genever to prove it), I can visualize how this would be done.
- Dead on the No-Fly List: schneier
- Which Browser Should I Use: Firefox or Chrome? – Web browsers – Lifehacker – I haven’t quite formally transitioned from Firefox to Chrome, but I use both pretty frequently.
- Bah, Humbug: Florida City’s Holiday Policy Raises Church-State Concerns « The Wall of Separation – Um … why does the city have to issue “official proclamations” recognizing any religious holidays?
- Why George Washington would disagree with the right wing about health care’s constitutionality. – HA! Of course, the early administrations did all sorts of things that TODAY would be considered unconstitutional (the Alien and Sedition Acts being an obvious example), but having this example to throw back at the GOP (tied to Militias and Gun-Bearing, no less!) is delightful.
- Bill Gates Wants To Build A Nuclear Reactor – And in the category of “Scariest Damn Idea I’ve Heard In A Long Time …” Radioactive Blue Screen of Death for the win!
- “Weird: The Al Yankovic Story” from Eric Appel, Aaron Paul, Olivia Wilde, Al Yankovic, Patton Oswalt, Paul Scheer, BRIAN HUSKEY, and christiansprenger – Video – No, not real, but an amazing facsimile …
Unblogged Bits for Mon, 15 Mar 2010, 12:11PM
- Song of the South: A Slightly Different Perspective – I agree that the live-action parts of this movie are dreadful — not just from an “accepting of racial stereotypes” perspective (though it’s done as benignly as possible), but from a “this is just badly written and badly acted” perspective. If Disney really wanted to do something, they’d give us a whole set of Uncle Remus tales, including the animation from this movie and adding new sequences. It would still engender some controversy, but would be a fine way to rescue what’s worth of this movie, justify having Splash Mountain at both WDW and DL, and provide some additional characters to profit more actively by.
- The Different Types of Hand-Washers: doghouse
- Busted! – DORK TOWER, Monday, March 15, 2010 – If only it were that straightforward …
- Ensign ‘under siege,’ but not from media – But remember, it’s “a liberal media” out there …
- Mass grave of executed headless vikings found in England – “Nasty, brutish, and short.”
- GOP Utah House Majority Leader Resigns In Wake Of Teen Hot-Tubbing Scandal – As is so often the case, it’s not as much the crime as the cover-up that gets ya.
- Axelrod taunts GOP: ‘Make my day’ – Without sounding too apocalyptic, this really is the Make or Break Moment for the Democrats for the next decade. If they get their act together, I agree: this is an election winner for them. If not, the GOP is in the catbird seat.
- Right Wing Plots Obstruction Of Obama Nominee Due To Its Missile Defense Theology – But St Ronald promised us Star Wars! To deny it is blasphemy! Block him!
- Employers Preparing To Shift More Health Costs To The Employee – The idea that people have a choice between the Democratic health coverage plan or keeping things the way they are is a false one. The status quo isn’t permanent, and has already been changing even as the debate has been going on, just in a “frog in heating water” kind of way.
- Media Matters staff: Kurtz: Some “Fox journalists” worried Beck “undermines their credibility” – I’ve little doubt that Ailes figures that, worse comes to worse, Beck can be simply fired. I’m sure Dr Frankenstein thought the same thing about his creation.
- Homemade Potato Chips Using the Microwave – Gonna try this
- Cracking open five of the best open source easter eggs – Moof!
- DORK TOWER, Friday, March 5, 2010 – Parenthood does, in fact, provide an interesting set of perspectives …
- The Ghosts of Amsterdam… – This really is very eerie in effect.
Unblogged Bits for Sat, 27 Feb 2010, 11:36AM
- Sometimes, America Makes You Just Want To Kick A Baby – This expresses a lot of the frustration I feel at the American socio-political scene (albeit in more colorful and expressive language).
- ‘Cause the Bible tells me so – But remember – if it’s about TEH GAYZ! it must be obeyed.
- Bors. – Sadly true.
- Great Geek Debates: Han Solo vs. Malcolm Reynolds | GeekDad | Wired.com – The analysis is kind of goofy … but I vote Mal, of course.
- Inhofe trying to get Bunning to end filibuster so highway funding doesn’t expire. – It’s all fun and games until someone’s ox gets gored.
- ‘Best health care system in the world’ – A key point in the whole debate — one not-unexpectedly obfuscated by the GOP: “No one is saying that there’s something wrong with America’s medical professionals, our technology, our facilities, and/or our ability to treat the ill. The United States has many truly extraordinary doctors, nurses, hospitals, and medical resources. The point is who has access to this quality care, who can afford it, who’ll die because they lack the necessary coverage, who’ll get kicked out of the system under rescission, who’ll never get into the system because of a pre-existing condition, and whether families, businesses, and government agencies will go bankrupt trying to finance such a system.”
- Japan’s Sewers Are Even Cooler Than Their Manholes – Very cool indeed.
- Shelby Dismisses The Adverse Effect Of His Holds On The Pentagon, Says He Has No Clue If Nominees Are Qualified – Arrogance and sense of privilege …
- The Real Problem With Midichlorians [Rant] – Mercifully, I never got involved in “Lost” … but there are some great lessons here on it (and Star Wars) that any writer should understand.
Unblogged Bits for Monday, 15 February 2010
- Any use of this article without the NFL’s express written consent is prohibited – I certainly appreciate wanting to protect one’s property. The 500-lb. Rabid Wolverine approach to doing so make it difficult, though, to have too much sympathy.
- What happens when you get drunk? – That’s a very interesting perspective on alcohol. “Drunkenness is not disinhibition. Drunkenness is myopia.” Have to remember that.
- Winter Olypmic Games Posters from 1924 to 2010 | webexpedition18 – Nice set of posters.
- in which the impact of twitter on my life is examined, and thanks is given to @ev and @biz – It’s all about communication.
- Daria DVD news: Box Art & Pricing for Daria – The Complete Animated Series | TVShowsOnDVD.com – Ooooh … and Daria’s coming out on DVD, too. Glee!
- The Flintstone Kids DVD news: Announcement for Saturday Morning Cartoons: 1980’s Vol 1 | TVShowsOnDVD.com – Okay, this is mostly dreck I wouldn’t want my daughter to get anywhere near. (Flintstone Kids? Shudder.) But Thundarr the Barbarian? I am SO there!
- A New Sith, or Revenge of the Hope – This is delightful and, to my mind, completely plausible as an explanation for inconsistencies between the first and second Star Wars trilogies.
- 5 Things Hollywood Reuses More Than Plots | Cracked.com – Some fine examples of “reduce, reuse, recycle” here. The Disney animation one particularly so.
- Simple wedding planning with Google Docs – Actually, this makes a great deal of sense. I’ve no idea whether the templates provided are any good, but just using Google Docs for wedding planning is a faboo idea.
- Snow Tracking – Most excellent.
- The depths of the ocean to scale
- The Escapist : Texas Mom Busted for Soliciting Teen Over WoW – This tale is so full of Wrong it’s hard to figure out where to start.
- The Escapist : News : Canadian Sex Ed Game is Weird but Informative – I like video games. I like sex. I’m not sure this is the “two tastes that taste great together” I was looking for.
- Shipshape – Another in a series of Things Everyone Should Have To Read.
Tweets from 2010-01-23
- Just watched "Phantom Menace" with K in support of her Star Wars Lego game. Feel ill, but felt that way before the movie. #
- Katherine has decided "The Shadow" is pretty cool, too. #
- You know, you'd think with about three weeks of regular warnings, you could actually get those numbers to me on time. Really. Idjits. #
Unblogged Bits for Friday, 15 January 2010
- ‘Mythbusters’ Grant Imahara Explains Something Gross (Not Safe For Lunch)
- The Six Million Dollar Jedi – Yes, what “Return of the Jedi” was missing was bionics sound effects …
- Multitasking in the “Mad Men” Era – Timesharing — ah, that brings back the good ol’ days. Though I get mildly miffed when people thing that the idea of “virtual machines” was invented only a couple of years ago.
- How the media can manipulate our viewpoint: xco
- Boy dies from easily treatable condition while family prays for healing. – Well, obviously, since his prayers weren’t answered, he didn’t have enough faith. QED. Or so some would say.
- Video Game Statistics At A Glance [Statistics] – Some interesting stats.
- Haiti 48 hours later – The Big Picture – Boston.com
- The Most Beautiful Woman – Well, that’s a fairly, um, narrow range of “celebrity beauties,” but the result is striking (to my eyes, at least).
- The end of Haiti?
- The Global Shipping Network Revealed – Very cool.
- Locals: “Your radio tower gives us rashes!” Company: “You mean the one that’s been off all this time?”: Devin Coldewey
- Much of Colorado’s aid to Haiti stuck in limbo – The Denver Post – We do a lot of medical and educational support work for Haiti, including in the town of Petit Trou de Nippes (referenced at the end of the story). It sounds like the school built there is okay (thank you, Engineers Without Borders).
- cartoon: suffering and stupidity graph | nakedpastor – For “stupidity” also exchange “arrogance” and “uselessness.”
- Limbaugh stands by his Haiti remarks, tells critical caller she’s a ‘bigot’ with ‘tampons in her ears.’ – Limbaugh continues to demonstrate what a really awful person he is.
- Pack a Gun to Protect Valuables from Airline Theft or Loss [Air Travel Tip] – Clever.
Unblogged Bits for Tuesday, 22 September 2009
- What If Star Wars Was Made By Environmentalists? [The Primate Diaries] – You’ll laugh! You’ll cry! You’ll kiss your cause good-bye!
- Religious philosophy, succinctly explained – Dear Lord, let that be Photoshopped. Yeesh …
- Insurer To 17-Year-Old: Your Parents Lied On Application, Good Luck Paying Your Bills [Rescission] – “People who care. Policies that protect” Bull-fucking-shit. Pardon my French.
- An Atheist Lawyer’s Alternative Oath – I think her response was perfectly reasonable. All the moreso because, honestly, swearing “so help me God” doesn’t seem to autmomagicaly make anyone more likely to follow through on their oath.
- Comcast responds to FCC’s Net Neutrality proposals: Slow down, partner, let’s talk about this – Hmmm. Who is more likely to have my best interests in mind? A faceless, soulless Washington bureaucracy? Or a profit-minded big-media monopoly? Given the choice between the two, I vote for the bureaucracy, if only because I indirectly vote for their bosses through the political system. Somehow, somewhere, the government is out to satisfy me to a sufficient extent that I vote for the status quo. Comcast doesn’t give a bloody rip as to whether I’m satisfied, unless it means I figure out a way to get broadband and cable without them.
- This Explains Sally Kern : Dispatches from the Culture Wars – Ripping my (minimal) hair out now. Rrrrg.
- The Difference Between Art and Design – I hear the distinction being made — but my immediate reaction is that a lot of it is still just hairsplitting.
- Glenn Beck: McCain Worse Than Obama – CBS News – Because God forbid that a “weird progressive like Theodore Roosevelt” might get into office. What?
Unblogged Bits for Tuesday, 15 September 2009
- General: Five Possible MMO Movies – Some interesting ideas, even if some are firmly tongue in cheek (or cautionary DO NOT DO THIS tales).
- Star Wars Galaxies: Twelve Servers to Close in October – As the galaxies start to collapse into a black hole …
- Vampire Diaries: The Diaries of Other Vampires Revealed – TWoP – Mwah-ha-ha!
- Operation Rescue Broke And On Brink Of Shutting Down: Alan
- Poll: Majority Of Republicans Opposes Wilson’s “You Lie” Outburst – One can but hope for a quiet backlash from the rank-and-file.
- House Dems: We Will Condemn Wilson For “Breach Of Decorum,” Not For “Speech” – It’s actually perfectly appropriate. If I’m at a dinner party and shout at someone that they’re a liar, I should apologize to them for the personal affront and to the host/hostess for being a poor guest. Wilson’s offense to the House was not that he expressed his beliefs, but that his expression was situationally inappropriate for the whole House.
- Rockefeller Announces He Will Not Support Baucus’ Health Care Bill – So most of the Dems aren’t supporting it … the Republicans aren’t supporting it … who the hell is Baucus actually getting to vote the damned thing out of committee?
- Former Health Insurance Executive Explains How Companies Pocket Billions Through ‘Rescission’: Victor Zapanta
- CWA: Repealing DOMA “Will Result in Reverse Discrimination” – Um, not being allowed to tell others how to live their lives is not actually discrimination against you. Really.
- Harry Potter and the Theme Park of Financial Ruin – Ooookay, yeah, it sound fun.
- How did 2,000-year-old feet find their way to a Dublin attic? – The Irish Times – Mon, Sep 14, 2009 – Um … I’m sure the real story is less interesting than all the other stories I could come up with.
- Is This What The Right Is Buying With All Its Maine Money? – And yet, despite nearly every penny coming from outside the state, the ad is full of “us” and “we Mainers”. Wonder why that is …?
- Google Chrome after a year: Sporting a new stable release – Cool. I’ve been using Chrome in parallel with Firefox during our corporate GMail experiment, and I’m pleased to see a new, faster version coming out.
- Rifqa Bary and the Plot To Destroy Our Constituion – All you have to do is read “America is succumbing to the stealth jihad that is inexorably insinuating that seditious Islamic program into our society” and realizing you’re dealing with incendiary style masquerading as substance.
- Alaska’s Lone Congressman Don Young Makes “Most Corrupt” List. Again.: akmuckraker
- Pelosi Stands By Public Option: We Won’t Pass The ‘Private Insurance Profit Perpetuation Act’: Igor
- The evolution of the Origin of Species – Short Sharp Science – New Scientist – That’s pretty darned cool.
- Ben Dimiero: My friend’s cousin said there were 4 million people there – My Lord, when even Little Green Footballs is pointing out your claims are absurdly based, it might give you pause. On the other hand, the Big Lie … does seem to work. For those who want it to be the Big Truth.
- Stormtroopers Never Forget
- The 10 Best (and 6 Worst) TSR Games that Weren’t D&D – This not only brings back memories, it discovers for me an amazing Secret (If Superficial) Connection Between TSR And My MOTHER! Which you won’t know until you get to the final entry, mwah-ha-ha.
Unblogged Bits for Wednesday, 19 August 2009
- Why geeks get the girls – life – 19 August 2009 – New Scientist – Well, my being one certainly netted me a fine catch.
- Where does white skin come from? – life – 19 August 2009 – New Scientist – Some interesting theories here.
- Rare Star Wars images – Photography | Lifelounge – Daily Goodness – “I’d rather be groped by a Wookiee!
- Theodore Olson’s Road to Championing Same-Sex Marriage – NYTimes.com – It’s refreshing to see someone for whom “conservative” doesn’t mean “what Pat Robertson says.”
- Basics – Brain Is a Co-Conspirator in a Vicious Stress Loop – NYTimes.com – Sounds like “take a vacation” is more useful than we know. I certainly know I find myself in this sort of rut sometimes.
- Mentations: How to add a ‘Note in Reader’ bookmarklet to your iPhone – Wish there was a straightforward way to do this on other platforms (e.g., OperaMini on my Blackberry).
- Young Atheists Are Coming Out of the Closet – This is a good thing. Regardless of what you feel about a (dis)belief system, it’s better that folks can be open about it and engage freely in the marketplace of ideas, not live in fear and isolation.
- Screw Key – Ooh, these look nice.
- House Dems Rally Behind Public Option In Weekly Caucus Gathering: The Huffington Post News Team
BT09 – F is for Fabulous (#Blogathon)


Fables, Vol. 10, “The Good Prince” (Vertigo) [collects #60-69]
Fables, Vol. 11, “War and Pieces” (Vertigo) [collects #70-75]
w. Bill Willingham; a. Mark Buckinghan, Steve Leialoha, et al.
| Writing | | New reader? | |
| Art | | Non-comics reader? | |
Willingham’s epic of Fairy Tales forced to our “Mundy” world in front of the conquering hordes of the Adversary, continues to a tremendous climax here.
In Vol. 10, “Flycatcher,” the erstwhile Frog Prince, and now a lowly janitor, is forced from his amnesiac shell to a quest worthy of Galahad — securing a stronghold against the Adversary from which a final attack can be made.
In Vol. 11, that war comes to a grand and bloody conclusion, as first the Adversary’s greatest secret weapon is neutralized, and then the technology of the Mundy World is applied against his empire. But will heroism and cleverness straight out of fairy tales prevail against dark sorcery, magic, and gritty determination? And if it does, what will the consequences be?
I’ve enjoyed this series from the get-go, and these two books continue its greatness. If Willingham does nothing else (and he’s doing plenty else), Fables will be what he is remember for — taking characters from myth and legend and turning them into believable characters on a wide-ranging tapestry, leavened with humor, personal touches, plot twists, and a hell of a lot of imagination. Highly recommended.

The Fairy Tales of Oscar Wilde, Vol. 1, “The Selfish Giant” and “The Star Child” (NBM)
w. Oscar Wilde; a. P. Craig Russell
| Writing | | New reader? | |
| Art | | Non-comics reader? | |
Not many folks know that Wilde wrote fairy tales. Russell does a fabulous job of adapting two of them here. In the first tale, a giant with a lovely garden has to learn a lesson about generosity vs. a cold heart. In the second, we get a bit different riff on Beauty and the Beast. These are nicely done tales in the Grimm tradition (if not quite as bloody as some of theirs), and this book could easily be given to a child or adult for their enjoyment.
Listening to: McCreary, Bear, “The Shape of Things to Come” (Battlestar Galactica: Season 1))
Unblogged Bits for Thursday, 09 July 2009
- Black kids booted from Philly club’s ‘whites-only’ pool – Ah. Here’s the beginning of the story. Yeesh. I’d hope this was datelined about 40 years ago, but …
- ‘Complexion’ of black camp kids not a problem at new pool – I missed the beginning of this story, but you can sniff out its stench in the body here, as well as in the appalling comments quoted. For all of you who consider this a “post-racial” society …
- Staver Exposes Obama’s Nefarious DOMA Scheme – It’s a plot! A plot, I tell you!
- Summarizing Negative Fan Reaction To Shatterstar – Not only can you not please all of the people to all of the time, but often the same people will be displeased even if you try to please just them.
- 9NEWS.com | City considers saving Coors Field’s scenic views – What a novel and worthwhile idea.
- A Brief Summary of the Ireland Blasphemy Law – I’m sure there are all sorts of folks who’d love to see something similar here.
- Hey, Netherlands: Fox News doesn’t like you [Pharyngula] – If the counter-example given to Dutch “militantly secular” society is George W. Bush … I know where I’d rather hang out.
- Warning, iDrive Lite Spams All Your Gmail Contacts Without Your Permission [Contact Scraping] – Spread the word. This is sucky behavior.
- I love the smell of the Chewbacca defense in the morning… – Wow — it’s rare you actually see someone literally dehumanize someone else.
- Granola and Masturbation – They’re Grrrrrrrreat!
- YouTube – Sesame Street: Grover discusses What Is Marriage? – What? A discussion of what marriage is that doesn’t mention God and the Bible and Spawning Young’uns and Properly Threaded Plumbing? Clearly Grover is a socialist pagan atheist liberal fuzzy-headed … oh, wait, he is fuzzy-headed …
- Hardware, Lightly Sauteed For Flavor – Yeah, I’ve had tech calls like that …
- Brian Kilmeade Would Like Species and ‘Ethnics’ to Remain Pure – fox & friends – Gawker – That’s some excellent, um, dementia he’s smoking there.
- Kindle Spying – Like most such things, it’s a very useful, even ingenious feature that creates some worry if it’s abused by the vendor (or through the vendor).
- FOX News Declares Obama Anti-Christian… For Air Force’s Decision to Keep Church and State Separate – Carrying on the idea of “If you are not for us, then you must be against us.”
- Sarah Palin’s not just a quitter — she’s a professional quitter. And taxpayers get the tab: David Neiwert
- Rupert Murdoch reporters in the UK illegally hacked thousands of peoples’ data: Cory Doctorow
Unblogged Bits for Friday, 12 June 2009
- Binwin Bronzebottom shirt NOW SHIPPING! – This is a thing of beauty.
- BBC NEWS | Middle East | Palestinian boy ‘hanged for collaboration’ – Sometimes I despair of understanding humanity.
- Responsible Racists Backpedaling Cautiously – See, this is what I love about the “responsible white separatist community” — they don’t condemn the attack as hateful, or evil, or murderous … they condemn it as “not helpful” or as “inefficient” or as making them “look bad.” If it had been a more efficient, better-targeted, heroic attack and murder, apparently that would have been jim-dandy fine by them.
- Tonight brings the end of Analog Television broadcasts. – Actually, I’d say that the easy addition of a digital converter box means that the old TVs are backwards-compatible … something that we may never see again, with hardwired DRM becoming more and more prevalent in video electronics.
- Good news and bad news [Pharyngula] – Attorney General Bruning, you, sir, are a jerk.
- Obama Pardons Girl for Missing School – Another video of this. Nice.
- Greg Mitchell: My Daughter’s Chilling Account of Years at Holocaust Museum – A must-read.
- Obama Writes Fourth Grader a Memorable Absence Note | 44 | washingtonpost.com – Excellent. Click through to watch the video. (The fact that he was listening to the question and ready to answer while writing the note is pretty cool, too.)
- Another museum in danger [Pharyngula] – Yeesh.
- [Cheap Gaming Accessories] A dish fit for your dice – That’s really quite clever. Not as romantic as a die bag, but probably more efficient. You could also use it to store color sets of dice.
- Poll: GOP lead by Rush, Newt and Darth – I think it’s most significant that “Nobody” is the winner in the survey, though, followed closely by Limbaugh. It’s off-cycle at the moment, but the GOP is at huge risk if they don’t come together pretty quickly. Hell, they’d be better off with a couple of factions than this sort of Balkinization.
- Five people miraculously survive after plane slams into ute near Johannesburg | World News | News.com.au – Some remarkable pictures. Money quote: “”The scary part was seeing the faces of the pilots looking straight at us.”
- Revealed: the bid to corner world’s bluefin tuna market – Nature, Environment – The Independent – Calling this despicable behavior seems too tame a phrase. We’re talking about both ecological and consumer exploitation, all for the almighty buck … er, yen.
- Steampunk has TWO syllables – I concur that “Girl Genius” isn’t steampunk (and, in fact, Foglio describes it as “Gaslamp Fantasy”).
- Passed Along with Little Comment – If a trend, there are some very bad times ahead of us, folks. And, of course, this sort of thing is never confined to a single issue. Once society (or vocal portions of it) seem to condone violence and threats thereof as a way to get a point across, it will happen all over.
- Playing A High Resistance Wind Instrument May Reduce Risk For Sleep Apnea In Musicians – This points to some interesting therapies for folks who have these sorts of problems.
- Hotel clerk lacking critical thinking skills does $50,000 in damages. – Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me multiple times into doing $50K of damage to our hotel …
- Irony Defined: Skin sanitizer recalled due to bacterial contamination. – Just too many kinds of wonderful here.
Unblogged Bits for Monday, 08 June 2009
- It’s So Personal: Anencephaly: Andrew Sullivan
- Just a Glimpse of an Ankle, and I React Like It’s 1805: Eric Martin
- Farai Chideya: Lee, Ling and North Korea: Are We Informed?: Farai Chideya
- Dave Hill’s Chihuahua Dance – Um, for the record, different Dave Hill.
- Polyhedral dice cake – Loverly!
- GOP Leader Working Behind Scenes To Get Palin Reinvited To Big Fundraiser | The Plum Line – There’s a certain degree of schadenfreude I feel, after decades of bumbling disunity by the Democrats.
- feature on Flickr – Photo Sharing! – As the old IT saying goes …
- U.S. Government Records Go Online in Volume – Very cool. And about time.
- Was The Right Thwarted By Cheney’s “Backhanded Pro-Gay Approach”? – MWAH-HA-HA! Darth Cheney is in your house, messing with your anti-gay marriage amendments.
- SBC Distances Itself From Drake and His Ravings – Good on them. I’ll even be charitable and assume that this matches their beliefs, too.
- Good News: “Baby Girl C.” Can Stay With Her Parents – Here’s some good news indeed. The court’s conclusion is dry but unequivocal — yanking the baby from an approved gay couple fostering her just because a judge thinks (without legal basis) a “traditional” family would be better is, well, not supported by the law.
- Post offices used to be awesome.: William Brafford
- Movie Review: Land of the Lost Rocks (Peter Travers Can Suck It!) – One of the more positive reviews of the film I’ve seen (though nothing here makes me want to go see it). Note that Brian Bendis (of all people) has suggested parents really, truly, definitely want to pay attention to that PG-13 rating, and that, the film’s heritage (and ad campaign) aside, it’s “highly inappropriate” for little kids.
- Teach your kids to argue – Katherine has begun making careful, reasoned arguments for things she wants, or when she thinks she is being treated unfairly. We are rewarding her by both praising the behavior and by conceding her point when she’s won it — things that some parents, sadly, are never willing to do.
- Most Bankruptcies Caused By Health Problems Suffered By People With Health Insurance [Survey Says] – Money graf: “So much for credit card companies trying to convince us that bankruptcies are caused by loose-willed spendthrifts with flat screens.”
- Oprah: Shame on you. – Wow. Good for Newsweek for having done this.
- Movie studios launch Epix, 720p streaming service for films – Ars Technica – Beware of Greeks bearing gifts.
- Robert Creamer: Fixing Health Care Does Not Require a “Bi-Partisan” Bill — It Does Require a Public Health Insurance Option: Robert Creamer
Unblogged Bits for Thursday, 04 June 2009
- No Reward for Nominating Moderates – The Washington Monthly – I think Obama should nominate who he wants, regardless of the GOP reaction. If moderates, fine. If wild-haired radicals, so be it. Because the GOP and the Right-wing Punditry is going to react the same way.
- Wiley Drake Prays For Obama’s Death – “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; even as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” — John 13:34-55. I don’t know which “God” Drake is referencing in his use of imprecatory prayers, but it sure doesn’t sound like any I’ve got an interest in.
- Maddow’s devastating expose: Tiller’s assassin tied to Operation Rescue, got away with federal-law violations: Heather
- The Hurricane Lantern Effect | Quiche Moraine – Yeah, some good life lessons htere.
- If Familiarity Breeds Acceptance, We Must Avoid Familiarity – Yeah, whatever you do, don’t associate with gays. Or the ungodly. Or the prostitutes and tax collectors and fishermen and Samaritans and stuff. I mean, the very idea. You wouldn’t catch Jesus dead with those sorts, you betcha!
- Heartbroken cereal litigant loses suit over non-existence of “Crunchberries” – Wait’ll she finds out the guy on the box isn’t really a captain, either!
- David Carradine found hanging from hotel wardrobe – News, People – The Independent – An exceedingly odd death.
- The Obama Plan – Part I : denialism blog – I’m actually pretty excited about this. I have no doubt that any system adopted will have problems that need to be ironed out over time, or costs that just have to be sucked up. But we do seem to have come to a consensus recognition that the current system is broken, and we need some sort of comprehensive fix — and the principles of universal coverage mingled with competition between private and public solutions sounds promising.
- Atheist Ethicist: Theism, Atheism, and Justifying Harm – I find intriuing the suggestion that the atheistic stance that theistic scripture and philosophy is just as human in origin (i.e., not really from God) as atheistic philosophy — and, thus, is no more intrinsically prone to evil use or misformulation than atheistic philosophy.
- Does the gender of a judge matter? – Interesting study results.
- Interesting Church/State Ruling from 3rd Circuit : Dispatches from the Culture Wars – As noted, this one is a pretty close call, and I could argue pretty vehemently on both sides if pressed. In the end, I think I disagree with the court’s decision, though I understand and even support the reasons behind it. Hmmm. I wonder if these finer and finer splitting of hairs, or cases where there’s clearly much to be said for both sides, will make things less polarizing than they have been. If you’re willing to admit the other side might be at least 48% correct, that’s a big leap forward.
- Hands-on: Star Wars: The Old Republic – I don’t see actually getting this, but the move in MMOs to actually have rich and diverse storylines is surely a welcome one to all.
- Rip Ride Rockit Coaster to Feature Individual Music Players, Multiple Cameras [Roller Coasters] – Okay, that sounds fun — but it’s more important, of course, that it’s a good coaster before all the bells and whistles get counted.
- An algorithm to simulate the sound of water – Cool!
- Tiananmen Square, + 20: Xeni Jardin
- Scientists tickle apes to reveal evolutionary origins of human laughter : Not Exactly Rocket Science – Very cool.
- The Line Between Harsh Condemnation and Calling for Violence : Dispatches from the Culture Wars – I’d say there’s a difference between criminal culpability, civil liability, and moral liability. Brayton’s Group B qualifies for the last, certainly not the first, and I would even argue (due to a chilling effect on speech) not the second. There should be social penalties for people whose rhetoric have an influence on people committing evil acts; adding civil (let alone criminal) penalties ups the ante significantly, and hurts more than just the folks like Bill O’Reilly.
- BBC America HD launch July 20 brings plenty of science fiction starting with Torchwood & Dr. Who – I have a post-it next to the TV to get these saved on the DVR. Hope we’re getting BBCa HD; I’ll settle for BBCa Low-Def if need be.
- Oh, The Compassion of Conservative Christians – “‘Now which of these three do you think seemed to be a neighbor to him who fell among the robbers?’ He said, ‘He who showed mercy on him.’ Then Jesus said to him, ‘Go and do likewise.'” — Luke 10:30-37. Sounds like a great (or highly needed) topic for a sermon at the church in question.