July 24, 2012
Now this is a story all about how / My life got flipped turned upside down / Even though I wasn't telling a story in the Red Chair
Will Smith, Gary Barlow (Take That), and the audience of The Graham Norton Show perform the theme song from The Fresh Prince Of Bel-Air". [performance begins about 1m8s into the clip]
Humans: Be Interested
There's been a lot of talk about the snarls and snafus preceding this year's games. But even as the training is winding down and the athletes are pouring into the Village, there's still plenty of interesting stuff going at this year's Olympics.
Like, have you heard about the Olympian without a country? (He's not the first independent athlete to compete.)
Or that almost all the US swim team gets themselves ritually tattooed with the Olympic rings?
Or that a California girl is one of Saudi Arabia's two female competitors?
Or that Caster Semenya (previously 1,2) will be South Africa's flag bearer?
Or that Nur Suryani Mohamed Taibi may be the first Olympic athlete to have to worry that a kick from her unborn child may put her out of the medal running?
The Christian Science Monitor has been highlighting athletes who's struggled to get to the games, including Behdad Salimi, who'll have to prove he's the strongest man in the world to bear Iran's lone medal hopes, Hiroshi Hoketsu, who's competing in his third Olympics this go round --- second since he retired from his desk job, and Gladys Tejeda, who grew up in a family of subsistence farmers in an Andean village so remote she hadn't even heard of the Olympics until her family got a TV --- in 2007. London will be her third marathon. Of course, there's another class of competitors whose fight to get to the games was a little more literal: This is the first year for women's boxing.... [more inside]
The Christian Science Monitor has been highlighting athletes who's struggled to get to the games, including Behdad Salimi, who'll have to prove he's the strongest man in the world to bear Iran's lone medal hopes, Hiroshi Hoketsu, who's competing in his third Olympics this go round --- second since he retired from his desk job, and Gladys Tejeda, who grew up in a family of subsistence farmers in an Andean village so remote she hadn't even heard of the Olympics until her family got a TV --- in 2007. London will be her third marathon. Of course, there's another class of competitors whose fight to get to the games was a little more literal: This is the first year for women's boxing.... [more inside]
Nothing bothers me about Janet's driving ever.
Steve Wozniak explains his rules of the road. My best habits include use of blinkers and not blocking others. I keep a good distance behind the car in front of me. I never tailgate. Also, I buy and study the large DMV handbooks from the first page to the last. I would never lie in traffic court. Once I was asked if I could have been going 75 mph and I told the truth, that I didn't know because I hadn't looked at my speedometer. I lost on that one. Steve Wozniak (Mefi's own-ish) fills in for San Jose Mercury News columnist Mr. Roadshow.
Racing in Slow Motion
The youtube channel Racing in Slow Motion hosts short films featuring scenes from motor racing in (you guessed it) slow motion. [more inside]
"Standing On The Edge of The Hoover Dam. . ."
Sugar's catalog has been remastered and reissued: "Mould laid down the roots of modern indie rock in the ’80s with his band Hüsker Dü. The fiery dirty punk torch Hüsker Dü ignited was passed to Nirvana, among other newly anointed grunge bands that flamed bright in the early ’90s musical revolution. Nirvana then passed the torch right back to Mould who infused his new band, Sugar, with a grunge-inflected pop punk sound scarcely heard before 1992, the year that Copper Blue was initially unleashed on the public." [more inside]
Bears
There is now a live stream of bears gathering to eat salmon at Brooks Falls in Katmai National Park. [more inside]
Parlez-vous war criminal? Leopold Munyakazi and Goucher college
Parlez-vous war criminal? Leopold Munyakazi and Goucher college Sanford H. Ungar, journalist and current President of Goucher, a small liberal-arts college near Baltimore writes about his experience hiring - unbeknownst to him - a Rwandan war criminal (Leopold Munyakazi) to teach French as a visiting scholar, and the aftermath for him personally. He examines the sometimes problematic desire from liberal arts colleges, or at least Goucher in this instance, to hire somebody controversial, and delves in to the blurry world of apportioning blame in the Rwandan genocide. [more inside]
Bob Dylan’s “Titanic” anticipated by Tim Heidecker
Rumor has it that Bob Dylan's upcoming album Tempest will feature a 14-minute song about the sinking of the Titanic, which seems pretty plausible, right? The guy has written about the Titanic before, and he likes to tell long, repetitive stories, not unlike your very talented Grandpa. Well, Tim Heidecker (of Tim & Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!) has decided to try and anticipate Mr. Dylan's song, creating his own epic that encompasses not only the amazing, historically accurate tale of the ill-fated ship, but also the adventures of a movie pirate named James Cameron.
Wait Until You See Her Make Cookies!
See Melati Suryodarmo's EXERGIE - butter dance. See butter dance set to Adele's song "Someone Like You."
Ye olde breastbags
A team of Austrian archaeologists has discovered four bras from the 1400s. It reveals that women wore the garment some 500 years before fashion historians thought it was invented.
To a deluxe apartment, in the sky...
Sherman Alexander Hemsley died today at the age of 74. Perphaps best known for his role as George Jefferson on All in the Family and its spin-off, The Jeffersons, Hemsley's career spanned over four decades, including working on stage, in films, and of course, appearing (or starring in) in many TV shows.
Around the world 20 times without a breakdown
Gunther Holtorff has been driving a Mercedes Benz Galaendewagen named Otto around the world for 23 years. 800,000km without a breakdown.
via Bring a Trailer
UC-Davis doctors banned from research.
2 UC Davis neurosurgeons accused of experimental surgery are banned from human research. Bacterial infection after surgery to remove glioblastoma is thought (anectodally by neurosurgeons) to confer survival advantage to patients, despite limited and contradicting information from previous studies (abstract 1, abstract 2). Drs. J. Paul Muizelaar and Rudolph J. Schrot, with patient consent, introduced Enterobacter aerogenes into open wounds of 3 terminally ill patients in an effort to prolong life. Two patients later died due to sepsis. Upon learning that Muizelaar and Schrot had given patients the bacteria, UC-Davis notified (pdf) the Food and Drug Administration of the serious non-compliance issue. Currently, both Muizelaar and Schrot remain employed at UC-Davis, and Muizelaar remains chairman of the Nuerological surgery department.
President of Ghana dies suddenly
President John Atta Mills of Ghana died unexpectedly today, with Vice President John Dramani Mahama taking the presidency. [more inside]
Syntax Nudniks of Our Time
I'm With The Band
Here Chicky, Chicky, Chicky ...
"According to a photo published to the 'Wipe Out Homophobia" Facebook group, Chick-Fil-A has announced a voluntary recall of Jim Henson's Creature Shop Puppet Kids Meal toys, and is blaming it on safety issues. There's no information on when the notice was allegedly put up, but the 'recall' is backdated to one day before the Jim Henson Company cut ties with Chick-Fil-A for its donations to anti-gay groups."* All this comes on the heels of Chick-Fil-A's COO, Dan Cathy, owning up to the company's contributions to anti-gay causes in a recent interview: "Well, guilty as charged." [more inside]
Russia and Syria
"The Western observer tends to split the Russian press into two camps: evil statists and martyrs. But for their part, members of the Russian press are convinced of their superiority over their Western colleagues, at least when it comes to Syria. Russian journalists aren’t under the illusion that they are more objective than their Western counterparts, but they are convinced of their ability to convey a more realistic, complex picture of the events in Syria." - The New Republic: In Russia, Even Putin’s Critics Are OK With His Syria Policy
Reactions to Gangnam Style
PSY (Park Jae Sang) is a Korean singer, previously graduating from Boston University and Berklee College of Music. His latest, Gangnam Style, parodies K-pop videos and features several singers from that genre, plus Korean tv stars. Gangnam itself is a wealthy region of Seoul. The lyrics are perhaps standard for pop songs, while reactions to the video [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] show that a visually engaging video and a catchy tune are often fun the world over, irrespective of the language.
We Happy Trans
We Happy Trans is a place to share positive trans experiences. The site features a project called 7 Questions, where trans folk discuss their lives. Notable contributors include site owners Jen and Noah, as well as "glittery hot pink polyamorous unicorn" Ira, Moose, who just started testosterone treatment, and Stephen, whose charm proves that not all celebrities' kids are screw ups. [more inside]
hey, you got the one thing that I'm angry about in the other thing that I'm angry about
An analysis of nearly 1,700 public and private nonprofit colleges being unveiled this week by Bain & Company finds that one-third of the institutions have been on an “unsustainable financial path” in recent years, and an additional 28 percent are “at risk of slipping into an unsustainable condition.” Presenting thesustainableuniversity.com.
How Big is the Universe?
How Big is the Universe? Measured with a protractor. Lots of Pictures!!!
SitOrSquat: Cheeta Camp
Mapping Toilets in a Mumbai Slum. As part of an initiative by the Harvard School of Public Health, a team of students is researching life in the Mumbai slum, Cheeta Camp. They started by studying sanitation and water use. Their results? This map of toilets.
It starts with you and me, we will make history.
Kim Dotcom - Mr President (SLYT)
"Reefer makes darkies think they’re as good as white men."
It's Not Just NYC: Across America, Only Black and Brown People Get Arrested for Pot - "New York City (previously), the pot-bust capital of the Western world, is notorious for the racial skewing (previously) of its marijuana arrests. Over the last 15 years, more than 85 percent of the half-million-plus people charged with misdemeanor possession there have been black or Latino. But the racial ratios of reefer roundups are equally extreme—if not worse—in scores of other U.S. cities." Same (trailer) as it (PDF) ever was? (video)
The ultimate buzzkill
Bats eavesdrop on the sound of copulating flies (includes grainy sextape). Another summary with additional comments.
For those who like to ride the horse in front of TV and in home comfort of their own space
Horse Riding Fitness Ace Power! [YouTube, NSFW] (maybe not safe for home either).
Ichiro Suzuki has been traded to the New York Yankees
Getting Warmer...
Was climate science the real reason the strategic dynamos on the UVA board wanted president Teresa Sullivan gone? The fund manager behind the coup is "very, very angry" that I would even ask… In a three-part series (1, 2, 3) of muckraking blog posts, journalist Moe Tkacik investigates the possibility that the failed ouster of President Teresa Sullivan from the University of Virginia (previously) might have been motivated not by vague conflicts over Internet-based distance learning, as had been speculated — but instead by global-warming-denial politics, with the coup plotters on the Board opposing Sullivan over the hire of climate scientist Michael Mann (previously).
Adventure Capital
How to make money with £100 Five Guardian writers speculate to accumulate.
Tomb Raider Design Comments
Tomb Raider: Anniversary, a remake of the original Tomb Raider, had an interesting bonus feature: the designers of Tomb Raider Anniversary and Tomb Raider discussed the differences in the two games, the process of the remake and what it was like creating the game in 1996. Youtube playlist
"He is no longer his own person."
The Checkpoint. An essay which looks inside the conflicted mind of an Israeli soldier, stationed at a West Bank checkpoint. By Oded Na'aman, currently a student in the Philosophy PhD program at Harvard University, who served in the Israeli Defense Forces from November 2000 to October 2003. Mr. Na'aman is also a member of Breaking the Silence, a website that gathers and publishes anonymous testimonials from IDF soldiers -- combat veterans -- about their experiences and the realities of life in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza.
the lengths people will goat to
Nightmare in the Andes
The highest inhabited settlement on Earth is La Rinconada, Peru, at 5100 meters above sea level. It is a hellscape.
The games began with piles of whitened bones, and horses' heads, and the skulls of men nailed to trees.
Star Trek TNG Reunion Serves Tea, Earl Grey, Cold.
Two remastered episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation were shown theatrically on Monday in the US, Canada, and Australia, to tie in with today's release of season 1 on Blu-ray. If you caught the screening, missed it, or never had a chance, I thought it would be a good time to present this April 2012 cast reunion at the Calgary Comic & Entertainment Expo. All the regulars were there, including demi-godish Patrick Stewart (previously), Denise Crosby, and Wil Wheaton. Diana Muldaur fans will be disappointed. Seeing these videos may result in an anomalous time loss of several hours, but you may as well get it out of the way before the Olympics. [more inside]
Predicting is hard. Especially the future
What Isaac Asimov thought 2012 would be like: "Assuming we haven't destroyed ourselves in a nuclear war, there will be 8-10 billion of us on this planet—and widespread hunger. These troubles can be traced back to President Ronald Reagan who smiled and waved too much." [more inside]
No Surrender: Springsteen at Sixty-Two
"I was raised out of steel here in the swamps of Jersey, some misty years ago..." The New Yorker's David Remnick profiles Bruce Springsteen.
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