June 16, 2009
Ice Football and the Golden Bowling Shoe
On May 29, 2009, Stuttgart took home the Golden Bowling Shoe at the first Deutscher Eisfusßball Pokal (that's "German Ice Football Cup" for the English speaking folks). Yes, that's right - those are grown men playing soccer, on ice, in bowling shoes. [more inside]
It's like Jezebel, minus all the totally obnoxious parts
Zelda Lily: Feminism in a Bra A new blog from that same people who brought you Evil Beet Gossip. Featuring an exclusive with Riam Dean, "the beautiful British law student with a prosthetic limb who was removed from her job at a London Abercrombie & Fitch shop floor because she violated their 'look policy'."
He owns a mansion and a yacht
Roman Abramovich, the Russian billionaire owner of Chelsea Football Club, has launched his 557-foot yacht, Eclipse.
Big fun with the Five Racketeers
Behind them on the stage, a giant watermelon. In their hands, little tiny guitars, which they play like mosquitoes on speed. They scat, they dance, they get halfway through the alphabet. Their percussionist has the coolest little drum kit ever, but that doesn't stop him from playing the stage floor and the walls. Who are they? Why, The Five Racketeers, of course! And who's that lady who storms the stage for a little shimmy at the end of the clip? Well, that's Eunice Wilson, and she stuck around to do another number with the fellows. You want more, right? OK! Then let's head down to the All-Colored Vaudeville Show, for some serious oooold-school entertainment.
Spare Change
Tomorrow, Obama will extend federal employee benefits to same-sex partners. But is it too little, too late to mend the growing rift between Obama and gay rights advocates, especially after last week's controversial DOMA brief (discussed previously)?
You Can't Filter Twitter: Clay Shirky TED Talk on Global Citizen Journalism
As turmoil continues in Iran, with protesters and members of the opposition party empowered by Twitter and camera-equipped cell phones, Clay Shirky gives a TED Talk on the emerging global era of bottom-up journalism, including the phenomenon of the transfer of social technology patterns from the second and third world to the first. Previously
It's Good To Be The King
Unallotment. Minnesota, known for its colorful politics now adds today's announcement by Governor Pawlenty that he is using his executive power to unilaterally cut $2.7 billion dollars from the state budget. The list of impacted state projects includes heavy cuts to education, health and human services, and funds municipalities rely upon for their own local budgets. Lawsuits claiming Pawlenty is overreaching his executive power are likely. You are probably not from Minnesota, so why should you care? Well, in addition to bringing the 2008 Republican National Convention to the Twin Cities and co-chairing John McCain's presidential campaign, Governor Pawlenty recently announced he is not running for a third term - and it is widely speculated that he may become the 2012 presidential candidate for the "new" GOP.
You know . . . for adults!
Hooping. The hoops adults use to dance and perform tricks are larger and heavier than the children's toy called the Hula Hoop. As hooping becomes more popular, people across the States and across the world are pushing the boundaries of dance and sport with a simple, easily made tool. Hooping for pleasure, exercise, and meditation is becoming a phenomenon. There's even a documentary. [more inside]
CSS3 Now
Take Your Design To The Next Level With CSS3. Why can’t we make use of the rich CSS3 features and tools available in modern web browsers and take the quality of web designs to the next level? It’s time to introduce CSS3 features into projects and not be afraid to gradually incorporate CSS3 properties and selectors in style sheets.
Mother Courage and her Infuseion
The Medill School of Journalism's Washington Program revealed its Pentagon Travel project last week (multimedia).
Most privately paid for travel was found to be within the bounds of federal law, but some still show a clear conflict of interest.
Key findings: From 1998 through 2007, sources outside the federal government paid for more than 22,000 trips worth at least $26 million. The medical industry paid for more travel than any other outside interest — more than $10 million for some 8,700 trips, or about 40 percent of all outside sponsored travel. Among the targets: military pharmacists, doctors, and others who administer the Pentagon’s $6 billion-plus annual budget for prescription drugs.
Medill acquired 10 years worth of trip data and partnered with the Center for Public Integrity to form a searchable database which includes destination, date, sponsor, sponsor nationality, cost of trip or agency.
Authors Can Autograph It
To Marty, This bespells doom! A recent reading in Manhattan at the Strand bookstore by David Sedaris, whose most recent book is “When You Are Engulfed in Flames,” may have offered a glimpse of the future. A man named Marty who had waited in the book-signing line presented his Kindle, on the back of which Mr. Sedaris, in mock horror, wrote, “This bespells doom.” (The signed Kindle was photographed, but its owner’s full name is unknown.)
Packing heat and boat shoes
Arlington: The Rap (SLYT)
Poster design and The Beggarstaffs
"Pryde and I came across it one day in an old stable, on a sack of fodder. It is a good, hearty, old English name, and it appealed to us, so we adopted it immediately."
That's how The Beggarstaffs, a short lived but influential paring of graphic designers, got their name. [more inside]
Dairy Odes
Oh cow, oh cow, what are you thinking? Should I leave the gate open?
Are you content? Would you be happy?
Do you yearn? Would you turn feral?
Do you want freedom? Oh cow
Greener pastures? Moo cow
A bull? Run free cow
The Online Dairy Ode Contest was a light-hearted, web-based, sister competition to the James McIntyre Poetry Contest. It was held at irregular intervals from 2001 to 2005. The only criterion for entry was that the poems had to be Dairy Odes; ie about dairy products, cows, or dairying.
Are you content? Would you be happy?
Do you yearn? Would you turn feral?
Do you want freedom? Oh cow
Greener pastures? Moo cow
A bull? Run free cow
The Online Dairy Ode Contest was a light-hearted, web-based, sister competition to the James McIntyre Poetry Contest. It was held at irregular intervals from 2001 to 2005. The only criterion for entry was that the poems had to be Dairy Odes; ie about dairy products, cows, or dairying.
Best. Babysitter. Ever.
Andrew W.K. (yt): Musician (yt), Motivational speaker (nyt) and now, kids show host (auto-playing video). via
chuck chuck chuck-it-too-ee zhew zhew!
So* you want to learn the Language of Birds? There's the mnemonic route and the youtube guide. You can listen to the birds in your local habitat or geographic area: New York State**, Florida, Southwestern US, Tropical America***, for example. Or, just find your favorite bird out of 104,517 audio and 33,693 video samples at Cornell's Macaulay Library, and listen. [more inside]
It's about quality, not quantity
For generations, anglers have performed worm grunting (a.k.a. charming, fiddling, snoring, rubbing, or calling) to entice worms out of the ground. Worm grunting even has its very own annual festival. After accompanying Grunting King Gary Revell Vanderbilt neurobiologist Kenneth Catania has explained why scraping a "stob" or twanging a pitchfork brings the worms a-callin'. [more inside]
Sex was the only answer. Total sex.
Has the mystery of sex been explained at last? Biologists have long struggled to explain why most creatures reproduce sexually
when they could just clone themselves – now at last it's becoming clear not only
why sex evolved, but when. - New Scientist
Animal Organs
The dead hand of neo-traditionalism
Controversy has erupted in Britain after it emerged that Prince Charles used his personal influence with Qatari royalty to sack modernist architect Richard Rogers from a development in London. Charles has been an outspoken critic of modern architecture and advocate of neo-traditionalist styles, and even created a model village to showcase his ideas about "proper" architecture. Charles' preferred replacement for Rogers is Quinlan Terry, known for his neo-classicist leanings. [more inside]
Uniting by dividing
Opera, the inventor of tabbed browsing who just won't quit, today released a trial version of Unite, a dramatic attempt to reverse the centralization of the web as well as Opera's own decreasing relevance in a market dominated by far larger companies [more inside]
Life imitating art
Why wasn't there ever an episode of Cheers where everybody couldn't remember anybody's name? That would've been hilarious!
Is there a question you've always wanted to ask about writing TV sitcoms? (Besides "Why bother?") Ask Ken Levine, the only living blogger and twitterer who has written for M*A*S*H, Cheers and The Simpsons (back when it was good), done baseball play-by-play for 3 Major League teams (and currently does the official DodgerTalk radio show), met Rush Limbaugh (when he was goodless awful), was once a disc jockey using the on-air alias "Beaver Cleaver" and had nothing whatsoever to do with the video game Bioshock.
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