Category: x-personal
Random and intermittent postings about life, the universe, etc..
Who wants a postcard?!
So we’re mostly settled in to the new apartment (update coming soon), and now we need to send out new address cards. If anyone wants a postcard or greeting card (not sure which yet) from sunny California, leave your address in the (screened) comments below.
California interlude 1
Took the afternoon off yesterday to go catch a movie at the nearby movie theater. Andy by nearby, I mean I can see the building from my bedroom window (so weird). Saw Red 2. Eight bucks for a matinee, that’s just nuts. On the plus side, concessions seem to be cheaper than they were back in PA.
The movie itself was okay. Not as great as the first one, still a lot better than most action flicks. It looked like everyone but Bruce Willis was having a great time getting together again & making the movie and he was only there because he had to be.
Safeway’s store-brand Cheerios taste pretty good, but they have texture of Captain Crunch. I never expected to tear up the roof of my mouth to the taste of nuts and honey.
And the best part of apartment living out here is that we get a constant stream of mail for previous tenants. So far I’ve been marking it “Return to Sender” and “No longer at this address”, hoping it’ll stem the tide over time. I know we still got mail for the prior tenant at our old place for years.
Protected: California update 2
Delicious Links for 2013-07-24
- How a 90-Year-Old Man Made the Most Metal Album Ever | Cracked.com
I’ve read that his metal albums are objectively awful, but you have to give Christopher Lee mega credit for trying.
- Rednex Vs Psy – Gangnam Eye Joe – YouTube
The mash-up that nobody was waiting for. Somehow it works, but it’s no less irritating than either song singly.
- The eyes have it: Seeing ultraviolet, exploring color | ExtremeTech
I’m still fascinated with the idea that some people gain the ability to see further into the color spectrum after cataract surgery.
- Hacking into the Indian Education System – On the Stepping Stone – Quora
So this college student from India tries to help out his friends by seeing if it’s possible to find out test results early, and he discovers that it’s trivially easy to see the exam results for every student who’s taken that exam across all of India. And just to make it more interesting, his analysis indicates that there’s widespread grade-alteration going on.
- Mind the Gap: A compendium of disturbing British public information films – Boing Boing Gadgets
There’s nothing quite as horrific as a British PSA. Everything usually start out okay, and then turns SUDDENLY AWFUL, as is usual on "knifecrime island".
- Lori Marino – Dolphins are not healers
An excellent deconstruction of the myth of dolphins as "mystical spirit animals" or "healers". Also touches on the troubling trend of using dolphins as therapy for autistic children.
- the ocean at the end of the lane (a book & marriage review) The official website of Amanda Fucking Palmer. Yes it is – Amanda Palmer
This is an absolutely lovely story from Amanda Palmer about being an artist, and marriage, and being married to another artist. I hope I can learn something from it, to be a better husband and artist with my wife.
- 3-D Printer Brings Dexterity To Children With No Fingers : Shots – Health News : NPR
How a carpenter in South Africa and a puppeteer from Washington came together to help children missing fingers, and even whole hands.
- What if we demanded Ted Cruz’s papers? – Salon.com
I love this – one of the vocal critics of immigration reform, and a possible Republican contender for the next presidential race, could actually be unable to prove his citizenship under the standards he has proposed.
- She stole another’s identity, and took her secret to the grave. Who was she? | Local News | The Seattle Times
A woman with double stolen identities, and the mysteries she left behind after taking her own life.
Protected: California update 1
Protected: Too tired to care right now
Again!
Somehow we’ve been selected to be a Nielsen family, for the second time this year. We got the “Are you interested?” letter in the mail just a few days after mailing in the May diaries and we figured it was just delayed. Then we got a phone call and I figured they must have figured this out by now. And now, we just got the new diaries for July.
I don’t understand this. It’s either an enormous error on their part or a really huge coincidence. Either way, we’ll take the thirty bucks again, even though we don’t have cable or satellite, or even rabbit ears.
Delicious Links for 2013-06-21
- Lenticular Photo Used To Secretly Convey Hot Line Number To Abused Kids | DIYPhotography.net
So this Spanish organization created a poster that to adults looks like a public awareness campaign, but to kids it shows a number they can call for help. I can’t help but love physical, real-world hacks like this.
- How to Make a Watermelon Keg (And Agua Fresca, Too) | Pretty Prudent
Delicious and playful instruction on how to turn a watermelon into both a refreshing drink and the delivery system.
- Orpheus | Myths RETOLD
A friend of ours lent us this book a little while back, and I love it. It’s like a drunken angry guy at the bus stop is telling you all these great world myths. I particularly love this one.
- Guillaume Lorentz – Macklemore (Can’t Hold Us) – Exclusive Hip Hop Dance in Japan – YouTube
These French hip-hop dancers just start dancing in a street in Japan. I’m sure it was all pre-planned, but it’s so infectiously joyful I don’t care.
- ▶ 01 Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger in The Madd Wikkid’s Brassft Punk – BRASSFT PUNK
Brassft Punk, a New Orleans brass band that does Daft Punk covers. Awesome and definitely worth a listen to.
- Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Official Trailer – YouTube
This looks like fun, but I especially love the tilt-shift effect at the beginning of the trailer.
- Antibiotics could cure 40% of chronic back pain patients | Society | guardian.co.uk
Not only is this fantastic news for millions of back pain sufferers, I think it’s awesome the way that science continues to discover new things about the stuff that "everybody knows".
- Swiss Army Key Ring
I love this, and when I again find myself in a position where I’m carrying far too many keys I’ll definitely make one for myself.
- Project Long Haul – Kokes dot Net
This guy spent month and months, and hundreds of dollars, to make his girlfriend a light-up engagement ring, with hidden LEDs and an inductive power source. He details the entire build process, and explains his thinking along the entire way, in this wonderful article.
- Coca-Cola ad says Coke vending machines can soothe India-Pakistan tensions
Say what you will about Coca-Cola as a product or as a company, they do hire some truly creative ad agencies. For this ad they placed two camera and touch-screen enabled machines in shopping malls in India and Pakistan. They then invited passers-by to play games with someone at the machine in the other country, and they both got a free Coke at the end of it. Cute, and heartwarming, but not likely to affect any real change. But still awesome in several ways.
- Queen + The Beatles – Fat Bottomed Girls Come Together (Mashup) – YouTube
I love YouTube mashups, I really do. And this one is particularly well done. It uses the similarity of the guitar beat in Queen’s "Fat Bottomed Girls" and The Beatles’ "Come Together" to blend them seamlessly together. I have to believe that if Freddy and John were still alive they’d have done this themselves in the studio.
- Giphy – Search Animated Gifs on the Web
When they say "on the Web" they really mean "on Tumblr", but it’s still a really fun search tool geared to animated GIFS.
- what i learned as an oompa loompa | Elaine Wherry’s Blog
A wonderful article about how software teams can learn a lot from brick-and-mortar teams. With some fun discussion of face blindness in the comments.
- Thrilling Adventure Hour #70: Sparks Nevada, Marshal on Mars, “The Piano Has Been Thinking” « Nerdist
I’m still enjoying the hell out of The Trilling Adventure Hour, and I was fascinated by this article about the process that went into the making of the musical episode of Sparks Nevada.
- If companies had realistic slogans what would they be? : AskReddit
Pretty self-explanatory; just a bunch of random internet wits trying to out-do one another and being hilarious in the meantime.