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Toe nail clippings! They're like tiny adorable bits of sea shell that your feet make, and you get to harvest!

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Just found out that Daniels, the duo who did Everything Everywhere All at Once, did the video for Turn Down For What, one of my favorites, and now that I think about it the parallels are pretty strong...

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sun tzu famously once said "post like you are unemployed even when you are not"

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A dick move is a bad thing, but a ballsy move is usually a good thing.

So f'in tired of witnessing utterly half assed mask wearing. How stupid are people?

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hat for my hat's hat

"Whatcha doin'?"
"Looking for frogs."
"How come?"
"I must obey the inscrutable exhortations of my soul."
"Ah. But of course."
"My mandate also includes weird bugs."

I'm sort of using this line as excuse of why I'm walking in the rain to McDonalds today to try the 2 "must get" items from McDonald's Worldwide Favorites menu.

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Bloomberg: Boston Built a New Waterfront Just in Time for the Apocalypse Sometimes Boston is so crazily haphazard in its urban planning. I feel we try to coast (no pun intended) a lot with ambient smartness from the universities but we don't actually always do a lot of thinking.

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Around 20 years ago (spring of 1999) the word "blog" was coined. Odd to realize that I've been blogging - daily - for over 18 years of that.

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Yeah, Burger King sounds cool and all until you say the words Hotdog Emperor

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Actually, it's only existentialism if it comes from the existentialism region of France. Otherwise, it's just sparkling anxiety.

Blender of Love

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from this tweet, The result of taking a panorama while rolling down a hill
The Museum of Failure.

Failure starts early on, when you break something as a kid, nobody goes 'yay [claps] good for you, you're learning about your environment', so failure is something that gets internalized quite quickly as something negative. We deal with failure and other painful sort of memories by ignoring them. Same way that the companies do... they fail with the product, and instead of learning from their failure they move on to the next big thing.

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With self driving cars becoming more popular it's just a matter of time before country songs include their truck leaving them too

People forget years and remember moments. Seconds and symbols are left to sum things up: the black shroud over the pool. Love, in its shortest form, becomes a word.

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In io9's coverage of the earlier episode "The Broken Man", Rob Bricken references Septon Meribald's speech on how much being a soldier in one of those armies sucked, and it stuck with me. (Especially since some of the armies in the show seem pretty darn polished.)

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RIP King Kong Kirk
what's that story? the lumberjack walks into the forest, the trees reassure each other "the axe handle is one of us!"

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apropos of nothing except my mom repurposing a just thrown out plastic bag as the wastebin liner There is no cause. There is no effect. There is only correlation.

I'm really starting to suspect that this might actually be the case.

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I think that "Yo" app, sort of like text messaging that can only say one thing, is kinda brilliant. Not $1 Million of brilliant, but a low friction way to say "I'm thinking of you" Had a small life lesson from my car last night.

I came out from a friend's and found the back hatch hadn't closed properly, the light was on in the back and the red light on the dash. (I had had a bike the rear of it for a while, and was driving around with the back mostly but not quite closed, but that had been earlier in the day.)

Luckily my battery was fine, and the hatch FELT closed after I tried slamming, and I wasn't getting as much wind noise on the way home, so I was ok with figuring out in the comfort of my own driveway.

Get home, get out my phone's flashlight, look for a sensor (since maybe it was closed, just not reading as closed), but figure it's all built into the latch itself. Fiddle with that, manage to lock the latch while the hatch was open which was kind of dumb, can't shut it, undo it, curse, slam it again, it feels shut and I can turn off the interior lights but the red light is still on, make some mental plans to bring in the car to a great garage I know in Cambridge the next day and realize it was the side door that had been not-quite-closed the whole time, the hatch was fine.

Sigh.

On the one hand having a single warning light for every door in the car is suboptimal, but there's a lesson here in not assuming what you know about any given problem.

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No matter how smart you are, you're smarter if you take the easy ways when they are available.

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There is just one thing--and I'm not it.

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Same model as previously (the gal, not the caveman dude from last time)

--via Scott Richards on facebook... (it's from Sculpture by the Sea in Sydney, AU -- some more info)

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Not sure if the novel "36 Arguments for the Existence of God" is heavy handed Ayn Rand for Atheists or if I'm just jealous of the characters

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Happiness isn't something you experience; it's something you remember.

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America used to be run by checks and balances. Today, it's run entirely by checks.

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Why do Staples and Office Depot smell the same? Is it paper, glue, or despair?

Coworker sent this one around... one of the most amazing "looks like it's moving but it's not" I've ever seen. (I also like the Madelbrot Set shout out) Click it for the full size version, around 4 times as large and a lot more effective. To view this content, you need to install Java from java.com
pnok - source - built with processing
My entry for Klik of the Month Klub #36... it's a 2 player game roughly like that old Crossfire toy/boardgame. Player 1 uses A and S, player 2 uses arrow keys left and right, and both players try to shove the green squares into their opponent's goal, first to ten wins.

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Amber and I caught the last week of the Jim Henson exhibit at the National Heritage Museum - this was one of my favorite doodles there...
--via Mighty God King Yesterday was a beautiful day for a parade.

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Quote of the Moment

Laughter and tears are both responses to frustration and exhaustion. I myself prefer to laugh, since there is less cleaning up to do afterward.

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A popular theme of bathroom decoration is- bathrooms?? Kind of like halloween costumes with the character's head emblazoned on the chest.

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hey you know who won the NBA championship? THE CELTICS and why did they? 'CAUSE BOSTON -AND MAYBE ME PERSONALLY- IS AWESOME So, some closing thoughts on Ben Franklin's Autobiography. (That's a link to the Project Gutenberg etext. It makes me wish print books were more searchable! But, the ASCII text drops the italics.)

I had no idea about Ben Franklin, Swimming Instructor:

On one of these days, I was, to my surprise, sent for by a great man I knew only by name, a Sir William Wyndham, and I waited upon him. He had heard by some means or other of my swimming from Chelsea to Blackfriar's, and of my teaching Wygate and another young man to swim in a few hours. He had two sons, about to set out on their travels; he wish'd to have them first taught swimming, and proposed to gratify me handsomely if I would teach them. They were not yet come to town, and my stay was uncertain, so I could not undertake it; but, from this incident, I thought it likely that, if I were to remain in England and open a swimming-school, I might get a good deal of money; and it struck me so strongly, that, had the overture been sooner made me, probably I should not so soon have returned to America.

It makes me want to posit some crazy alternate history where Ben Franklin stayed and became a swim instructor, and somehow that caused monumental changes in the landscape of international relations with the Revolutionary War being replaced by some kind of swim-off. Ben Franklin-led squads of English Aristocratic swimmers vs a George Washington-coached ragtag squad of Americans... the minutemen, who could swim 5 boat-lengths in that time, or some such, with the fate of colonial independence at stake. (More on the history of swimming strokes, includes a reference to Thévenot, whom Franklin namedrops.)

A recurring theme was about how to conduct oneself during a debate:

I even forbid myself, agreeably to the old laws of our Junto, the use of every word or expression in the language that imported a fixed opinion, such as certainly, undoubtedly, etc., and I adopted, instead of them, I conceive, I apprehend, or I imagine a thing to be so or so, or it so appears to me at present. When another asserted something that I thought an error, I denied myself the pleasure of contradicting him abruptly and of showing immediately some absurdity in his proposition; and in answering, I began by observing that in certain cases or circumstances his opinion would be right, but in the present case there appeared or seemed to me some difference, etc. I soon found the advantage of this charge in my manner; the conversations I engaged in went on more pleasantly.

Now, that's my default way of arguing... except I think my reasons are less valid. I'm deathly afraid of being wrong, so I'll weasel my way into an ultimately unassailable position, hiding behind the final refuge of only describing my subjective observation. (I was also truck by the use of the word "positive", meaning "assured" as opposed to "good"... this usage predates, and preemptively argues against, the philosophy of "positivism" that would emerge later.)

That said, I think I am willing to admit when the thrust of my argument has been thwarted. And sometimes I learn something. This weekend working in Rockport the song "Missing" came on, with its lyric "And I miss you / Like the deserts miss the rain". It's a lovely lyric, but I always wondered if it was reasonable to think of deserts as "missing" the rain. I mean, aren't they in their own way viable ecosystems? EvilB countered with a description of the amazing and awe-provoking flowering that occurs in desert areas when a rain does come, even in regions that have gone for years and years without water. That was an excellent point, but then made me wonder if it's fair to use "the deserts" when you mean "the biomass of the deserts"... he countered with, well yeah, but "and I miss you / like the biomass contained with desert regions miss the rain" just doesn't scan. That got me wondering about what is the intentionality of desert regions? If they have one, than I'd say their longing is to grow, to devour more former woodland and pastures with sand and aridity... in which case they wouldn't miss the rain at all. (They might miss the wind, though, if it wasn't around, to help blow the sand and extend the borders.)

Silly argument, but a fun bit of deconstruction to go along with stripping paint off of deconstructed window moldings, and making it that much more agreeable. (Later he reacted negatively to my saying that he "brought up some good points" as debat-team-ish damning with faint praise, but I was being absolutely sincere.)

Finally, back to Ben and forming an early fire fighting company:

Our articles of agreement oblig'd every member to keep always in good order, and fit for use, a certain number of leather buckets, with strong bags and baskets (for packing and transporting of goods), which were to be brought to every fire;

I guess that speaks of the improvements of fire fighting technology over the years, that you'd see situations where there'd be a fire at a neighbors, and the safest thing to do is to bug out with your stuff, but you need something to pack it in. (Though as he noted: "since these institutions, the city has never lost by fire more than one or two houses at a time, and the flames have often been extinguished before the house in which they began has been half consumed" - that's actually quite a record!) It also reflects how consumer goods have become much cheaper in the meanwhile, and, I think, buildings more expensive.

(Heh, even when I write this, I have to remove many instances of "I think" and "I guess". I shouldn't hedge my bet quite so often when I write, but it's my nature to do so.)

Now Reading: Eleanor Rigby by Douglas Coupland

PS After the video I posted the other day, EvilB wanted me to assure his wife that those balloons, having had a happy time celebrating their daughter's first birthday, were old, sick, and tired, and despite the growling and goofiness, it was actually euthanasia... see, balloons don't want solemnity and dignity when it's time for them to move on, it's just not in their nature. Every once in a while I get reminded that there are some parts of Salvation Army culture that would seem very odd to me if I hadn't grown up immersed in it. Most have their roots in the paramilitary "war against sin" format; the uniforms, "ranks" for the "Officer" clergy, calling a church a "corps" and an offering an envelope a "cartridge" (it took me a while to get that joke, since mostly I associated cartridges with Ataris.) Today I was reminded of "Timbrel Brigades"... small groups, mostly young women, who would do synchronized routines with tambourines, most often to some militaristic Salvation Army brass band music (the 'Army has a strong brass band tradition with a lot of marches.) Here's a page on the Playa Ancha Timbrel Brigade with some photos and a little more detail.

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Quote of the Moment

I think that past the age of thirty there is no obligation to be clever at all. Cleverness is a burden after that. You are supposed to settle down and be a good person, raise your children, and be good to your friends, which you may not have been back when you were clever.

I need to see, or at least netflix, that Prairie Home Companion movie...

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Video of the Moment
A parody but supposedly done by Microsoft employees, iPod packaging as redesigned by Microsoft.... Wickedly amusing and also with some neat insights into the design and layout process: Passage of the Moment

And then she hears the sound of a helicopter, from somewhere behind her and, turning, sees the long white beam of light sweeping the dead ground as it comes, like a lighthouse gone mad from loneliness, and searching that barren ground as foolishly, as randomly, as any grieving heart ever has.

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Dream of the Moment

I had a dream last night that I met Kirk, but his face was Patrick Fugit's from 'Almost Famous'. I was at some crafts festival in a cold state, and I had on a black beanie, (I don't even own one) and he just walked up and introduced himself with a big smile. It was so vivd.

Movie Geekery of the Moment
We already know that "You Can't Outrun a Bullet", but just how fast are the explosions and T-Rexes and what not we see movie heroes and heroines running away from all of the time? Check out The Reality of Running Away.

Shakespeare of the Moment

ROMEO 
O, thou wilt speak again of banishment.

FRIAR LAURENCE 
I'll give thee armour to keep off that word:
Adversity's sweet milk, philosophy,
To comfort thee, though thou art banished.

ROMEO 
Yet 'banished'? Hang up philosophy!
Unless philosophy can make a Juliet,
Displant a town, reverse a prince's doom,
It helps not, it prevails not: talk no more.

Years ago I saw the Cleveland Ballet's production of Romeo and Juliet and the only part that really stuck with me (other than the way the supposedly just slain guys in tights where very clearly still panting like a lizard onstage) was this exchange, with Romeo rolling on the floor in emotional agony. Back then I wondered just what those philosophies of such comfort would be...I think I had that quote in the back of my head as I assembled the Skeptic's Guide to Mortality

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Observation of the Moment
I realized sometimes I use emotional memory as an aid to regular memory...continuing the ongoing moving-in process, I come across an odd canvas maroon belt. I can't think of what it's for. But I notice for some reason I have some feeling of guilt about it, something I should be doing...oh, right...it's a yoga belt I got at Target a month or so again, and I've been slacking on my yoga...(lately I have an excuse what with my back and all, but still...) Does anyone else do that? Happy GIF Liberation Day! One of the most popular graphical formats for the web, for anything with simple colors and cartoonish layout (or animated, in the case of small gif cinema) (photographs usually use the jpeg format) is about to have its patent expire. Geeks remember back to the mid-90s when Unisys acquired patent rights to the algorithm used in 'em. It didn't have a big effect on the web, despite efforts to promote alternatives, though digital art programs had to cough up. Anyway, now we're in the clear! ('Algorithms probably shouldn't have patents anyway' is a common geek idea.)

Now if we could all agree if it's pronounced with a soft "G" as in "Giraffe" (which is what the original creators argue) or a hard "G" as in "Graphical".

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Quote of the Moment

This wasn't just plain terrible, this was fancy terrible. This was terrible with raisins in it.

And given how much I despise raisins...man, that IS terrible. (Maybe it's all because when I was young my dad tried--and failed, I think--to convince me that raisins were flies with the wings picked off.) In any case, one of life's biggest disappointments is to take a big bite of cookie and the expected chocolate chips turn out to be raisins...

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Article of the Moment
You might need to be a member to see it all (which you should be anyway) but in Salon, Stephanie Zacharek makes an argument that Sarah Jessica Parker is probably guiding her character to close to the center stage of "Sex in the City"...and her unwillingness to get naked, unlike her 3 co-stars, is part of that. To which I agree. But maybe I'm just that kind of voyeur.

Oh well, we don't get HBO anymore anyways...it turns out that if you want to actually have a good chance of a decent movie at any random hour, that Starz/Encore package is a much better bet than HBO et al, which seem more geared towards their original programming. (Or of course if you are just in it for the boobies, Skinemax--er, Cinemax, is your best bet, at least in the wee hours.) Man, I have weird food issues. I've had to tell Mo to stop bringing interesting pre-prepared food home for me from Bread & Circus. I don't need it like I did when I was unemployed and had a tendency to seek out random fastfood crap for lunch...but I'm tempted by it in the evening, when I'd kind of prefer not to eat. But I just get really curious about what its taste and texture, or maybe it's just another form of procrastination (it would be more fun to be eating than do whatever I need to be doing) and then I want to eat it just so I won't be thinking about it so much.

I'm trying to cut back in general, but it's not been as effective as some previous times at the outset, maybe my metabolism is changing. I'm having a nice chicken kabob salad for lunch, but either my weight's very stable right here, or the small snacks I have in the evening are killing me (usually I don't have an evening meal.)

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Link of the Moment
Let's play spot the irony! (via camworld)

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Quote of the Moment

If I ever get the chance, I have a couple of questions I want to ask God, and it's not the usual 'Why is there suffering?' I'd like to know what the biggest, grossest bug that ever crawled on anyone, but they didn't notice, and then it crawled away.

E-mail of the Moment

>  in other news, i am trying not to worry
>about having no money at all.
They say money is the root of all evil but being that "virtuous" sucks ass. I think an artist can pretend he or she is "living like Henry Miller" for only so long before that idea wears really, really thin.

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T-Shirt:#2 of a Series

"Blue Man". From the Blue Man Group show, probably when I saw it NYC with Marnie, circa... 1994 or so, give or take a year. Back when making fun of the flying toasters was kind of fresh. I've gotten another, better Blue Man shirt since then. This one is odd, it's a minimalist image of them behind their welder's masks.

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News Link of the Moment
From Salon.com, studies on what men and women look for in a mate. With women it's smell, which puts me in pretty good stead I think, though I'm a little worried about that 'ambition' thing. (Oh, and in another Salon piece, let's hear it for minimum sentences! Nothing like the legislature sticking its nose where it JUST DOESN'T BELONG. Cut judges some damn slack! Foolish liberals try to restrain "Maximum Bob" style punishment and all the stupid conservatives can see are judges who are "soft on crime".)