April 24, 2007
Covers ears "yayayayayaya"
Bush's Mistake and Kennedy's Error. What happens when someone says, "I was wrong"?
Turn on, tune in, get out
Entheogens and Psychotherapy. A 2001 paper by Canadian psychotherapist Andrew Feldmar on the potential therapeutic uses of psychedelics and his own experience with LSD. Now, because of this paper, he is no longer allowed to enter the U.S. [Via MindHacks.]
Flower Vase Made By Bees
Map of maps, timeline of timelines
Milestones in graphics, maps, and visualizations. An incredible site for anyone interested in the history of visualization of data. See the first town map from 6200 BCE. Take a look at some of the most important graphics through history, including the London cholera map and the diagrams that made Florence Nightingale's case, as well as recent examples of some of the worst. Also check out the fascinating history of timelines, or Cabinet magazine's beautifully illustrated Timeline of Timelines.
Portrayal of the Artist as an Interpretive Dance
Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, Portrayed as an interpretive dance. It's got a slow start, but it's still strangely adorable. We are entering a new age of Joyce scholarship.
SCIENCE!
"UNTIL you experiment with chlorine, you have missed some of the biggest thrills your home laboratory can give you." Sound like fun? Bet you'll want to set up your own home chemistry lab and try it out. But don't stop there - the wonders of hydrogen and mercury await! Make a gas that gives you the giggles, then blow stuff up for more guffaws. And that's just part of only one section of Modern Mechanix - "Yesterday's Tomorrow, Today!"
Anti-RIAA clearinghouse
Tom Smith's Free Music.
Tom Smith is your average guy who likes comic books, Harlan Ellison short stories and Julie Newmar in a Catwoman suit (who dosen't?). Except the thing is, the guy can sing and write music too. And he releases a free song every week at his iTom page. Like most artists his music can be hit and miss, but there's some great free music to be found there such as Contessa and the awesome Jim Henson tribute A Boy and His Frog. Oh, and he also runs the 'Digital Acoustic' livejournal, where he discusses all manner of things such as comics, politics and of course, music. Sure, he's no cortex, but he's pretty damn good and well worth a listen.
My mother is a fish.
Faulkner or machine translation? Who wrote it? William Faulkner or some German-translating computer robot program? You decide!
I'm so loathsome I could spy...
I used to wonder where all the protest songs had gone. Now I’ve found where over 17,000 (and counting) of them have gone. Audio conditionally NSFW. via
Welcome to the Jungle...in Illinois?
Geologists have discovered the remains of one of the world's oldest tropical rainforests , near Danville IL. The four square miles of fossils are in a coal mine 250 feet below the surface.
It really tied the room together
Obviously, you're not a golfer. So let the WiigoBot do all the hard work.
A home away from home?
Spacefilter: ESA telescope detects planet 20 lightyears away with a temperature between 0 and 40 degrees Celsius, dubbed "most Earth-like planet yet."
The next thirty years of war
The British Ministry of Defence has been thinking about the future, and 2037 looks like it'll be a doozy. Others have been thinking about it too, and they believe they'll be mainly hot, sweaty, dirty and confusing.
Of course, if you're the Canadian military, you get a science fiction author to write your future for you.
"I ain't a pretty boy no more"
"I ain’t a pretty boy no more" Roger Ebert is determined to attend his Overlooked Film Festival tomorrow.
We spend too much time hiding illness. There is an assumption that I must always look the same. I hope to look better than I look now. But I'm not going to miss my festival.[via]
10 Easy Steps to American Fascism
this is going to change the world ...
Gizmo - using news footage from the 1920s to the 1950s, Howard Smith created an amusing 1977 documentary about contraptions made by the inventors, technophiles, and eccentrics of yesteryear. The last 7 minutes is Letterman interviewing Smith. (Google video, 1 hr., 19 min. Via beans beans good for your heart)
Bush vs. Congress: the Iraq spending bill
Elizabeth Drew analyzes the current confrontation between the White House and Congress over continued funding for the Iraq war. Under Nancy Pelosi's leadership, Congress has reached an agreement to pass a bill which approves $124 billion in funding for the war, but sets a timetable for withdrawal. Following the passage of the Senate bill in March, Bush gave a more-than-normally petulant speech against the Democratic proposals—prompting Pelosi, like a mother scolding a teenager, to urge Bush to "calm down with the threats" and to "take a deep breath." This was the first public suggestion by a prominent elected figure that the President lacks maturity—a widely held view in Washington.
Climate change explained!
Connie Meskimen of Hot Springs, Arkansas has a down-to-earth explanation for climate change! What the scientists and the Fifth Column environmentalists bent on wrecking American industry hope that you'll overlook!
Mummenschanz on the Muppets
not just optical illusions
Illusion art by Octavio Ocampo, a painter from Mexico. Sometimes illusion art is made using unlikely materials, like Jason Mecier's art made out of beans, noodles etc. [previously] or like Scott Blake's barcode images. [more inside]
Free audio podcast of The Globe’s 2007 production of Much Ado About Nothing
A free audio podcast of The Globe Theatre’s 2007 version of Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing has been posted online by the UK's Department for Education for use by teachers and pupils without easy access to a professional production but can be downloaded by everyone. Streaming and mp3 versions available. [via]
"Is it getting heavy?"
Kryptonite! A new mineral has been found in Serbia which 'closely matches' the chemical compound of Superman's least favourite substance (sodium lithium boron silicate hydroxide). Too bad it isn't green.
Let's cut to the chase.
My Amiga is crying, Fred Fish is Dead
Fred Fish Passed away April 20, 2007 If you were an Amigan, Fred Fish was well known to you. Responsible for the definitive archive of Amiga Freeware, Fred was the Santa Claus of software, his disks containing a selection of everything available for the Amiga at the time. Fish Disks inspired many an Amigan to purchase a modem and log on for all night bbs downloads of the vast selection available. Thanks and Rest in Peace Fred.
George on Laura Bush: Carpet matches the curtains.
"As he has before, Bush told the story about how his first presidential decision was to pick a rug for the Oval Office..." In a speech before Ohio High Schoolers and business leaders in a
Republican district outside of Dayton,
the
President made some interesting commentary on marriage, chicken-plucking,
polling, his own legacy, comparisons between Iraq and Vietnam, and of course,
the
rug. Apparently,
he
loves the rug like Ronald Reagan loved Jelly Beans,
talking about
it
all
the time, even on the whitehouse.gov's
video
tour. Shortly after a President takes office, they
make
their own imprint on the character of the Oval Office by redecorating, a
task usually taken by the First Lady. The rug, designed by Laura Bush is
sunshine
yellow,
as the President stated
he
wanted the room to convey a sense of optimism, "because you can't make
decisions unless you're optimistic that the decisions you make will lead to a
better tomorrow." Hopefully the rug doesn't become a bookended anecdote to
another
Presidential
"rising"
sun.
Getting down with the kids
Child prodigies. (Just in case you were starting to feeling content with your middle-aged achievements.) [Warning: YouTube-heavy posting] [Warning: Chopin-heavy posting]
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