MetaFilter posts tagged with whimsy

Baby is invincible. But baby can't jump and climb ladder.

ignignokt — Thu, 02 May 2013 08:28:27 -0800

Keita's Quick Ideas. In 2011, Keita Takahashi, designer of Katamari Damacy, joined the team of the unconventional MMO game Glitch (previously), which had to close its doors last year. The Glitch people have since published 200 of Keita's ideas for the game.

Sequencing a Science Fiction Writer

restless_nomad — Sun, 17 Feb 2013 13:40:25 -0800

Campbell-award winning science fiction writer Jay Lake has cancer. His prognosis at this point is not good, but there is a distant hope - cancer genome sequencing. This is an expensive process, so the science fiction community got together and held a fundraiser, volunteering "Acts of Whimsy" as rewards for various monetary goals. The results were whimsical indeed. The rewards were many and varied. Among the more amusing: - Embarrassing juvenilia from Tobias Buckell, Jim C. Hines (recently on Metafilter,) and Patrick Rothfuss - A variety of performance art, embarrassing to greater and lesser degrees: Mary Robinette Kowal reading the first lines of beloved classics in the style of phone sex, Paul Cornell singing, or perhaps "singing," Kate Bush's "Wuthering Heights," Mefi's Own John Scalzi performing a lost Bob Dylan song, and Seanan McGuire's Veronica Mars-fanfic Shakespearean play, "The Tragedy of Lillian Kane," performed as a radio play with an all-Squeecast cast. (MP3 download at Dropbox) - Various less-categorizable whimsical acts: Stephen Gould agreed to run for SFWA president, noted Kilingon expert Lawrence K. Schoen delivers five pickup lines in the original Klingon, steampunk author Cherie Priest attempts to wedge her unenthusiastic pets into alternate-period finery. The fundraiser hit 50% of its goal in about an hour, and, once PayPal was cajoled into unfreezing Lake's account, ultimately reached 243%. Jay was, and is, most grateful.

Of possible punctuation past.

titus-g — Fri, 18 May 2012 16:49:11 -0800

Unicode’s sad lack of intellectual smileys | And, really, wouldn't this be a better world if we had a rhetorical question mark?

BIRD CALLS and SONGS

puny human — Mon, 22 Nov 2010 15:46:37 -0800

BIRD CALLS and SONGS: A blog about the bird sounds of eastern North America and beyond. Featuring Nightjars, the Blackbird and Tits. (~v~)

Now entering The Dark Zone.

MimeticHaHa — Wed, 15 Sep 2010 15:15:49 -0800

It's 1962, and for a few glorious months the world stands still and looks (down, down, down) to Atlantis for the World's Fair. Perhaps you also missed the 1924 El Dorado World's Fair? And of course reserve your tickets today for the 2040 Moon World's Fair. (Experiments in Typography on the Web, via Waxy Links.)

Care for some beef, old chap?

lucien_reeve — Fri, 28 May 2010 02:10:10 -0800

I say! Professor Elemental, pith helmeted explorer of the outer reaches of steam-punk hip-hop feels moved to write a letter - deploring the behaviour of a young fellow named Mr B. As it happens, there is a much better quality version of "Fighting Trousers" on the Professor's page. Mr B has occasioned comment in these circles in the past, here and here. Professor Elemental seems a more whimsical fellow - more H G Wells than P G Wodehouse, if you will. Follow him in building a flying machine ("Penny Dreadful" at his steampunk site), celebrating tea or just performing disturbing experiments on our animal brethren! Meanwhile, Mr B has been heard to pass some cutting remarks about Radio 1 DJ Tim Westwood. Will the Professor's challenge pass unanswered? Has chap hop parody spawned that species of lively creativity and backbiting that marks a genuine artistic movement? Will Americans ever learn to make a decent cup of tea?

I love your suffering

mikoroshi — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 00:11:41 -0800

Geek Heroes sing "We Love xkcd" As a follow up to this animation of the original strip Neil Gaiman, Cory Doctorow, Wil Wheaton, Hank Green and a cast of dozens sing of love and geekiness.

Let's treat the next person. What to treat them with? It's your choice.

boo_radley — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 09:44:06 -0800

Then, according to Noby, as quickly as it appeared, the Ogori cafe was gone. (via Matt. Hi, Matt!)

Magazines as Fabric

ocherdraco — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 20:07:05 -0800

Artist/Designer Ilisha Helfman makes clothes for her custom made paper dolls every week from the cover of the New York Times Magazine.

Our insect is in another casserole

artifarce — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 14:28:25 -0800

Sure you consider yourself a retro 8-bit gaming geek, but have you played Udon Boy in Ramen Land, or Kung Fu Psycho Rider? Don't feel bad, they're from Japanese culture store Meteor's annual Famicase, an exhibition of imaginary games.

HI I'M ON METAFILTER AND I CAN OVERTHINK A WORLD OF BEANS

JHarris — Sat, 20 Dec 2008 18:32:04 -0800

Tales of the Beanworld ("A most peculiar comic book experience") recently resumed publication after a long hiatus. It's a strange and abstract mix of Native American mythology and culture, with a strong ecological focus, into an wonderfully charming cosmology. While it certainly invites, uh, overthinking, it's also entertaining on a purely casual level.
A sample short Beanworld story is on the Dark Horse Comics Myspace page.
If you have questions about it, the BeanWeb just may have answers, along with illustrations from the comics. There is now a Beanworld Wiki to supplement it, and creator Larry Marder keeps a blog where he talks about things bean.

Okay, now that it's properly introduced... the real point of this post is to link to this awesome Beanworld Flash cartoon, animated by Fashionbuddha and with music by They Might Be Giants!

It's a ninja. With a tuba.

desjardins — Sun, 07 Dec 2008 17:48:42 -0800

A collection of weird and whimsical pop culture t-shirt designs.

beastlies

dhruva — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 08:15:00 -0800

Sculpted Beastlies (A flickr set, via)

Gopher Hole Museum

Tube — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 16:40:47 -0800

While in Torrington, Alberta you can visit the world famous Gopher Hole Museum. The museum features dioramas of taxidermied Richardson’s Ground Squirrels in humorous situations.

Lies I've told my three year old recently.

boo_radley — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 10:52:18 -0800

Lies I've told my three year old recently.

Fafblog's back baby! Have some pie!

JHarris — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 11:58:16 -0800

After nearly 21 months of hiatus, whimsical politics blog Fafblog is back! And it's redesigned, too! Right now I would ordinarily include a link to best posts of the past, but I would have to include all of them.

Kick. Punch. It's all in the mind.

rouftop — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 11:08:10 -0800

New York artist Rodney Allen Greenblat's new show starts tomorrow at BCB Art in Hudson, NY. His paintings and sculpture evokes Picasso and Calder while maintaining a whimsical charm.

But he's still best known for creating the floppy two dimensional characters and whimsical backgrounds of PaRappa the Rapper. Step on the gas, now turn to the left!

Out in the Country

adamvasco — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 07:15:01 -0800

Walking the Dog "All photos in this gallery were taken within a radius of about 3 miles of our home in the North Pennines Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, mostly one handed while hanging on to an impatient dog with the other hand."

Smokey Stover

JHarris — Fri, 18 May 2007 10:28:57 -0800

Foo! Notary sojac! 1506 nix nix!

Is it a peahen, or just a pea?

iconomy — Tue, 23 Nov 2004 08:00:12 -0800

Do you have trouble distinguishing between a crow and a crocus, or a parrot and a carrot? You may want to refer to How To Tell The Birds From The Flowers: A Manual of Flornithology for Beginners. (caches inside)

Fop? moi?

amberglow — Wed, 18 Aug 2004 21:15:17 -0800

Lord Whimsy--Mammal of Paradise --Essays, Charts, Trifles, and News. A COMPENDIUM of DEEDS and THOUGHTS never before seen in this, our Benighted Age; the BRILLIANCE of which cannot last long in our WORLD of MUD and TEARS.

The Swinging Artwork of Shag

Joey Michaels — Sun, 31 Aug 2003 02:46:20 -0800

Shag's Online Galleries (NSFW). Pour yourself a martini and slip into some hip retro art by Shag. I particularly enjoy Dead Musicians Suite and Death's Endless Vacation, but there are plenty of images with no skeletons in them for those of you who prefer celebrities, monkeys who wear fez or dangerous women.

corky cuteness

iconomy — Wed, 19 Feb 2003 09:35:58 -0800

Mamiko picked up a cork that had rolled on the floor at the restaurant where she worked. From it she made her first tiny cork doll. She is often asked where she gets all of her corks. "I don't drink so much, but all of my friends who can drink quite a lot keep many corks for me." The pacifist is my favorite.

hats made of balloons

iconomy — Tue, 03 Dec 2002 05:23:48 -0800

Addi Somekh and Charlie Eckert travel around the world, photographing people wearing their spur-of-the-moment, whimsical balloon hats. It's hard not to smile when you have an inflatable, multi-colored crown on your head. Via obsessive Magnificent Obsessions.