Off to visit my brother and sis-in-law and spend the night in the wilds of northern NJ, as my company's annual picnic is being held about 4 miles away and I'd rather roll out of a guest bed 10 minutes before the picnic starts than schlep into Manhattan to make a 7:15 AM bus. Also, seeing my brother and sis-in-law! And sushi! I'll miss Robin, but spouses aren't allowed at the picnic. And while my bro has wifi and all, I don't know how much blogging, etc. I'll actually be doing, so I may as well do my Silly Site now. Yesterday we were speaking of kaleidoscopes; here's the new very cool video from OK Go which uses that and lots of other neat effects:
I also love the lyrics and the point of the song. Via The Mary Sue.
So here's a thing called a Rorschmap (via BoingBoing), which Robin and I think looks more like a kaleidoscope or a Mandelbrot. But the Rorschmap of the Bronx looks very cool! Be sure and drag your cursor back and forth to change the kaleidoscope.
It's Phil Proctor's birthday, and I'm sure he has better things to do than greet his adoring throng at Firesign chat so I've just signed out of there for the day. It's also my cousin Daniel's birthday; he's way too young to know about early video games so I'm posting this to educate him:
Monday. Heat broke, but intermittently rainy. *Yawn.* Please enjoy these parody ads via BoingBoing. Glad we don't have T-Mobile any more. Shuffling off to sleep now.
Stayed away from the computer most of the day, but got a lot of offline comics reading done. Down to just the DC stuff and graphic novels now! Meanwhile in San Diego, I'm sure there's been a lot of Arty Bullocks (via Gerard) going on, so just as well I wasn't a part of it, I suppose.
As the heat continues, I went out early this morning to get the car washed and pick up my dry cleaning, hoping the Staples next door had Brita filters (they didn't, and I wasn't about to spend any more time outside driving to/going in and out of the supermarket). Seems that our water had been tasting a bit funky for awhile and neither of us had thought to inspect the pitchers. They got a thorough cleaning yesterday and suddenly my stomach feels a lot better! Provided I stay indoors, of course. It's a working weekend for Robin, who has more DC work with a Tuesday deadline. Speaking of comics, Nerd Prom continues, I don't miss it at all, and here are some illustrations of Animals Drawn Poorly on Cocktail Napkins With Lasers Shooting Out of Their Eyes (via The Awl).
I'm in hiding today. I determined it's better for my health to stay indoors as much as possible, so I forewent the commute and am staying home from work today. Nor am I at Nerd Prom (I haven't been to San Diego in at least a decade), but that doesn't mean I can't pass along the Comic-Con Bingo card:
Have fun out there, friends! We'll see you in a few months at the New York Comic Con, which is far less expensive for us (only the cost of Robin's table)!
The heat wave is upon us, and it's already taken a toll on my system, so I'm going to bed. It's hell out there and, just in time, BoingBoing has given us a sneak preview of the Encyclopaedia of Hell. Enjoy.
A good day for catching up, when I probably should have slept more after the Yankee Stadium Macca-stravaganza. (Sorry, I'm tired.) As if to make up for last night's weird jingoistic sight of a Knight of the Realm running about a stage waving a giant American flag while 50 thousand-plus attendees mindlessly chanted "Ooh ess eh, ooh ess eh," the USA women lost the World Cup to Japan today, and I couldn't be more thrilled. (To be fair to McCartney, an equally massive Union flag was also on display; kinda reminded me of our apartment window in the days after Nine-Eleven and before Iraq.) I spent most of the day watching sport and catching up on DVR'ed programs whilst ironing, and am pleased to say I have finished the latter and at least caught up on the former to a great extent, including slogging through at least four episodes of Web Soup, the only real gem from which was this video:
Still very bleary-eyed from the McCartney concert yesterday. We live a pretty short way from Yankee Stadium, only about 45 minutes via local bus and subway, but we didn't get home until well after midnight. He played two and a half hours, including two amazing guitar solos. A 69-year-old wunderkind, that bloke. In full, beautiful voice, with a tight band, terrific set list, special guest Billy Joel, appreciative and polite audience (we were in the "cheap" seats and didn't experience any rowdiness problems at all) of all ages, terribly overpriced merch none of which I bought... I'm going to be processing this experience for the rest of my life, I think. Absolutely best concert I've ever been to. And, I think, the last one I'll ever attend. Because nothing will ever top it.
Meanwhile, on the home front, Amy explores the laundry basket, or vice-versa:
And then finds herself in Robin's arms.
Photos offloaded from smartphone camera - none of my Macca photos came out well, we were too high up and the lights were too bright. I can haz more sleep now?
Yeah, I'm psyched for the last Harry Potter movie too, even though I don't think I saw the previous one, and I don't even think I bought the DVD of Book 6 yet. I'm a bit behind in media lately. :) Anyway, via Ladies Making Comics, I thought PotterPoffs Central was adorable, so I guess Naomi succeeded.
The weekend really knocked me out, and I think I caught a bug in Jersey. I can barely sit in front of the TV and veg out. Maybe if I had a weird reality show to watch (via Generator Land)...
Well, you could have knocked me over with a feather, someone here around Mom's house has wifi, so I'm online again hours before I thought I'd be! Did a lot of blog catch-up (and very little graphic novel reading) last night, and quite enjoyed this video that PZ Myers posted:
Like Dr. Myers seems to, I have a relatively low tolerance for Auto-Tune, except in circumstances like this when poetic speech is made more musical.
I travel today to the Land of Dial-Up for an overnight with Mom, in whose house even my cell phone doesn't work. Talk about being off the grid! I'm actually taking books with me. Real books, with spines and pages and everything. Okay, graphic novels, but still. Which segues nicely into the Periodic Table of Geek Storytelling:
Via The Mary Sue. You'll want to enlarge it with your browser's zoom thingie. Speaking of geek storytelling, one reason I'm venturing into Jersey alone this weekend is that Robin has a few pages to ink, working over our friend Jamal Igle's pencils, on the final four pages of Superman #714, the last issue before DC reboots its universe again with 52 issue #1s. We didn't see the script, but vitually, I found the last panel to be absolutely perfect. Can't wait to see it when Robin finishes inking it!
I finally got through reading Frank Rich's in-depth analysis of where he thinks President Obama went wrong on fixing the economy and holding our current Depression's perpetrators to account. So it's probably a good time to get rid of some political "silly" sites I've been saving up. First, via Digby, it's Mother Jones with How to Make Your Lie Go Mainstream (in 26 Easy Steps):
Happy Independence Day to my fellow US citizens! Although we're pretty much binational here, and I have no intention of achieving independence from Robin. In fact, I quite like many British things and people, including Charlie Brooker, to whose videos Susie introduced me. Here's a series entitled How TV Ruined Your Life.
Part 1 - Fear:
Part 2 - The Life Cycle:
Part 3 - Aspiration:
Part 4 - Love:
Part 5 - Progress:
Part 6 - Knowledge:
Happy viewing! We of course will be watching 1776 today, which ties into the Aspiration video with my favorite Peter Stone quote: "Don't forget that most men with nothing would rather protect the possibility of becoming rich than face the reality of being poor. And that's why they will follow us to the right, ever to the right..."
This "Weird" Al song is mostly for Robin but kind of for Mom as well, only she'll never see it because it's a video and she's in the Land of Dial-Up:
I wonder if Mom remembers me going to see "Weird" Al in concert back when he first got big. This is a pretty good parody of Steinman's music! Via Augie.
In other photo news, I'm busy uploading all the photos from Mom's 80th birthday party up into the cloud, and at the moment I'm experiencing a bit of a personal rainstorm there, so please be patient.
