Although I suppose today's Children in Need day has officially ended in the UK, I'll bet you can still give. Here's Peter Kay's animated contribution:



Robin walked me through this one, as I didn't recognize about half of the characters.

The hot topic on Firesign chat tonight?



Words fail me.

Been watching wacky food-related shows in preparation for tonight's episode of Top Chef. Since that show's on Bravo, I thought Steakhouse or Gay Bar (via Xeni at BoingBoing) was an appropriate link for today.

Because every now and then I have to return to my roots, and because I'm too tired at the moment to go seeking anything else, I present a recent interview with The Firesign Theatre:



Via Tom Gedwillo and his Chromium Switch, whence you can also grab all the old Four-Alarm FIRESIGNal issues I self-published in the '80s and '90s.

Last week our local PBS station ran a show on how the Beatles influenced Russian youth and, all domino theory-like, led to the breakup of the Soviet Union. [Yakov Smirnov] "In Soviet Russia, glass onion looks through you!" [/Yakov Smirnov] Anyway, while the premise was largely hogwash in my opinion, and it was creepily male-centric for a group with such a solid female fan base through 3+ generations, bits of it were rather charming in that doesn't-quite-translate way. Like the many weirdnesses of English Russia (via Lauren at io9), which in turn links to things like 10 Famous Paintings Recreated in Vegetables. And what's not to love about Santas Take Over the Moscow?

"'Scuse me, Mommy? Mommy? It was Friday the 13th and you didn't post a picture of your black cat!"



"Mommy? MOMMY?!"



Don't let him fool you, he was just angling for more cat treats.

So I decided to explore Flash by Night, the home site of Drench (to which both Robin and I are currently strangely addicted), and I may never get any work done again, damn it. I tend to prefer the puzzle games to the arcade-type ones, and the one that intrigues me the most so far is 7 Down because I still haven't figured it out but I seem to do pretty well at it.

Robin thought The Human Printer was a good silly site, but I just find it kind of peculiar. Let me get this straight: human beings sit there and trace photographs halftone-dot by halftone-dot? And I mean, more than one human being? To what purpose? Although they're currently contracted by Nike to do a couple sports photos, so I guess someone likes it. (I'm the old-fashioned type, I tend to prefer Leroy Nieman for sports painting and Seurat for pointilism.) If you're as fascinated by this as Robin, here's a gallery.

May as well get a jump-start on "tomorrow" (actually later today). I've been promising myself to go on Facebook more to keep in touch with friends and relatives, so maybe I'll be inspired by the Facebook Conversation Generator (also via the Comedy Central Insider blog).

I've been so busy playing Drench, I am no longer aware of all internet traditions. Here's "Charlie Bit Me" (of which I'm clueless) Auto-Tuned (of which I'm not):



Via Joselyn Hughes at the Comedy Central blog. Whoa, the CC blog has an actual female? Any chance of any more actual females making the Daily Show or Colbert writing staffs?

Continuing with the theme, here's your God FAQ (via Lambert). Oh, and by the way, do you know how you can tell it's November in NYC? The Thanksgiving Parade viewing stands have started to go up along Central Park West.