Inkwell left me a present...

Apparently, I haven't been paying close enough attention to him, as he managed to throw up in the front window sill without me noticing. I'm not sure how long ago it happened, as I don't open the front window unless I absolutely have to. In addition, I'd built up a "cat castle" in front of the window, making it a safe space for him to get away from humans.

Well, he took advantage of it.

I just spent the last half hour scrubbing the area and vacuuming up the remaining chunks. It looks to me like it was a dinner, so it probably happened in the middle of the night sometime. It was dried enough that cleaning it wasn't too bad, it just required some scrubbing.

I have been in a major depression with some anxiety attacks for the past few months. It's been bad enough that I've been trying to stay inside and away from people. I'm going to have to break out of it soon. It's not a comfortable way to live. As a meme on Facebook said, "Depression is when you don't really care about anything. Anxiety is when you care too much about everything. And having both is just like hell."

In lieu of forcing myself to be creative, here's a summary of some of my recent Facebook posts - stuff that I found interesting enough to share.

Andy Borowitz again hits one out of the park with Nation with Crumbling Bridges and Roads Excited to Build Giant Wall. Infrastructure, infrastructure, infrastructure. We need leadership that will rebuild our infrastructure, not make stupid promises about walls on our borders.

U.S. Doctors Call for Universal Health Care. A single-payer system is the only moral system. Companies that profit from denying care, which includes most health insurance companies and many pharmaceutical companies, are basically evil. If the goal is increasing shareholder profits and not saving lives, then the companies should go away. Forever.

CharityWatch ranks lots of charities, including The Bill, Hillary & Chelsea Foundation. Note the extremely low overhead of the Clinton Foundation, at only 12%. The charity gets an "A" rating because most of its money goes to help people. The numbers being used by conservative critics are not false... they simply count everything that isn't a grant as overhead. Since the Clinton Foundation assists people using other methods besides grants, the critics' numbers are misleading and basically a giant lie.

When we lived in Frankenhaus, one of the biggest problems we ran into was keeping the blackberries under control. Well, we have Luther Burbank to blame. I've spent many days at Luther Burbank Park, so I was a little surprised to read the history of the man. Kind of strikingly eye-opening, and not in a good way.

I quite liked this tweet:

So Sarkozy calls the burkini a 'provocation.' Whether women cover or uncover their bodies, seems we're always, always 'asking for it.'

— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) August 25, 2016

In case you don't know the backstory, several seaside towns in France banned the "burkini", a full body covering suit that allows Muslim or similarly shy women to go to the beach without exposing themselves. At one beach, a woman wearing one was forced to strip by police. That's right. Police forced a woman being modest at the beach to strip. The French Supreme Court banned the laws, but they are apparently still being enforced and a disturbing percent of the population is just fine with it. On the one hand, I'm kind of relieved that another country is outdoing America for sheer stupidity, but on the other hand, really, France? Really?

Women can't win.

New DeLoreans are being built with original parts. These will reportedly have a much better engine. I'm just going to take the opportunity to note that I got to ride in a DeLorean on Back to the Future Day, something that will stay with me for the rest of my life.

On a very light note, the entire British Olympics team had an unfortunate airport problem. Oops.

I don't know if you'll be able to see this if you don't have Facebook, sorry, but Dee Snider did an acoustic version of "We're Not Gonna Take It" that is just amazing and done for all the right reasons. I'm going to try to embed the YouTube version:


Moving on, Phil Plait got really excited about a new astronomical discovery. What does it mean, practically? Not a lot for the average person, but it expands and changes our knowledge and potential understanding of the universe.

A teenager in Montreal showed himself to be a true man by calmly saving a woman from a kidnapper. If that story doesn't bring happiness to your heart, you're probably dead.

A post by a Fort Worth mother of a note from her child's teacher has gone viral. Basically, the teacher was informing parents that the children would not be assigned any homework - only work they didn't finish in class - and urged parents to do evening activities with their children that are proven to correlate with student success. Activities like reading together, eating as a family, playing outside and getting to bed on time. My response is positive. I didn't do homework. I always asked myself if I could pass it if it were on a test. If the answer was yes, I ignored any homework assignments. If the answer was no, I went to the teacher to get it fully explained to me so I could pass it on a test. Homework never figured into my understanding. It was all just busy work. Pointless and useless. If I understood it, why would I want to waste time and energy doing another 50 problems? If I didn't understand it, I couldn't see how struggling through 50 problems would help me in any way.

If you haven't read the Hugo-winning Short Story "Cat Pictures Please", go check it out now. It makes me want to take photos of Inkwell and post them. If only I weren't so upset at him at the moment for his present he left in the windowsill...

Offside Coin

A very cool new set of coins has been released in the UK to celebrate the Olympics. The best of the lot is probably the Soccer Coin, which tries to explain the offside rule.

Despite my love of coins, I think it's fairly unlikely that any of these will end up in my hands. All of them are very cool, though.

A Sunday Review

The Olympics have taken over my TV, and although I have at least one show I tend to review sitting on the DVR, I haven't watched it yet because I've been watching Curling, Hockey, Ski Jumping, Alpine Skiing, Biathalon, Speed Skating, and other events.

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Here are reviews of the DCBS comic book shipment that arrived this week, of books originally released February 3rd and 10th:

• Blackest Night: Wonder Woman #3 - Wow. Wowow. I'm not entirely certain what Mera and Diana were talking about, but I have a little notion based on the "I never wanted children" comment in a previous Blackest Night book. I have this feeling that I'm not going to enjoy some of what happens in Brightest Day.
• Justice Society of America Annual #2 - My order of reading got jumbled, and I read JSA All-Stars before this one. Good thing! This follows directly on from the end of All-Stars despite coming out the week before. I'd be REALLY annoyed if I had read them in the order they came out. As for the book itself, I'm seeing shades of Kingdom Come.
• Demo V2 #1 - Hrm. Not the most thrilling start to a new series of Demo, but as usual a very intriguing story. You are left to wonder, "what next?" and that is the strength and weakness of the book. I'm scared of the next issue based on the preview.
• Doctor Who #8 - Not sure about the artwork in this one. The story seems to be shaping up nicely, but the art is distracting.
• Sarah Winchester #1 - I bought this book on the strength of my love of the Sarah Winchester story, and as it turns out, I adored this alternate history horror version and really really hope we get more issues. Good stuff. If you like horror, this might be something you want to check out.


• JSA All-Stars #3 - As I've already mentioned, this one leads up to the annual as Magog and Power Girl work out their differences. Still enjoying the back-up story as well.
• Super Friends #24 - Lots and lots of villains in this one! Yay!
• DMZ #50 - A series of vignettes about the DMZ, some going into full stories but some more day-in-the-life than anything else.
• Legendary Talespinners #1 - We got this book on the strength of the flying monkeys on the cover. And it's starting out fairly interesting. I'm hoping for some Oz content in the second issue, but if not at least it's a slightly compelling story.

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My library book this week was Three Cups of Tea: One Man's Mission to Fight Terrorism and Build Nations... One School at a Time by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin. The story at the core of this book is essential for people to understand. Education, particularly the education of girls, is the key to stopping many conflicts around the world. Specifically, if the United States had invested in fighting the Taliban by building schools and communities to counter the Saudi Madrassas prior to 9/11, we may have been able to prevent everything that happened in the lead up to the terrorist attacks. But only a handful of people understood the situation, and even fewer acted on it. Greg Mortenson is one who acted. In this overwrought retelling of Mortenson's life, we learn how and why he originally went to Pakistan, and the many many mistakes he made as he slowly learned that helping people to live a better life is the highest calling of any human being. Many readers will have trouble with the way Relin has decided to tell Mortenson's story, practically as a work of fiction, but the style does have some advantages. As we approach 2001 the reader feels the tension, knowing what is going to happen and seeing (probably for the first time) the building of Bid Laden's strength. You also see just how many Muslims despise the Taliban and what they stand for, but cannot fight the waves of ignorance alone. Like the dude in the bookstore, my first thought after finishing this book was a strong desire to go to Pakistan and pick up a hammer to help build a school myself. It may be more useful to just let people know about this book, about the Central Asia Institute and the effort to educate people away from extremism. Now if we could only fight the same level of ignorance in the United States... but we have to fight against apathy as well as poverty.

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Fortean Times #256, January 2010. So I got this before the December issue, but waited until I'd gotten and read the previous issue before I jumped into this one. Since then I've gotten #257, and have been slow about getting started on reading it. #258 will no doubt arrive before I finish the reviews of these two I've got in my possession!

Cover story is about Dennis Wheatley, a pulp paperback writer in the 1970s, and doesn't really do much for me. Oh, the whole occult thing is vaguely amusing for how much money he managed to get riding the wave and giving audiences what they expected, but the occult doesn't interest me except as boring people trying to spice up their lives by being what they perceive as "bad". Bleah. Give me science any day.

Strangedays starts out with coverage of balloon boy... *sigh*. There's a section on brains, and how some people manage to live without much of one, literally. Then there are a few pieces on hexed souvenirs. There's an article about holy relics of a French nun visiting the UK. The Archaeology section is about the Anglo-Saxon treasure discovered recently (cool!). Classical Corner is about witches, and Ghostwatch is about ghosts who steal things. There's also a report about a mythic Hindi bridge and the Ig Novel Prizes. The UFO files has more on chinese lanterns, including deaths of livestock from eating the wires and the fear of fire during a dry spell. There were also reported power outages when some lanterns hit an electricity station in Vietnam. So, they may be pretty but they are also dangerous and lead to UFO sightings.

The Blasts From The Past article is about a poltergeist mystery from 1922. There's a report on the UK Skeptics' 2009 Conference in Muncaster. There's a good long article about the 50th anniversary of The Twilight Zone that made me want to see some of those episodes again. The Dictionary section is about Psychic Photography, and I'm not particularly impressed with the tales of Ted Serios and his works.

The Forum has articles on Shark attacks (very timely) and the Dorak Affair. I'd heard bits and pieces about the Dorak Affair, but never the whole story, so the article was of great interest to me. Hoax or real, it's a strange mystery. The reviews are great, and a couple of them made me put the books on my "to find" list. The letter column this month was also pretty good, including a truly spooky "It happened to me..." about a girl who has memories of dying in a fire. All-in-all, another fun issue of one of the best magazines out there.

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Past Sunday Reviews -- Comics at Amazon.com -- Previews -- My Wishlist

SO Much to Talk About, Where Do I Start?

Well, there's been a few... developments... in the greater world that I feel I should address. So I'll ramble on a bit. Those of you who hate my opinions may as well stop reading now.

First up is Tiger Woods. I don't care. Period. That's all I have to say on the matter.

Next up is the Haiti incident with the doofus missionaries: They are idiots. The children being brought out of Haiti had, for the most part, been in the process of being adopted for YEARS before the Earthquake. Waltzing in and thinking you can just take children off the street was ridiculous, if not actually evil. There's a reason the process takes a long time, and those missionaries deserved the punishment they got and more, and should be glad they are getting off easy. Twits. Morons like them make it more difficult for the legitimate adoption agencies to work.

Education: Big Brother is Watching You. This story makes me see red. The school claims the cameras were only turned on if the laptop was reported stolen, but if that's the case, why was the kid disciplined for "improper behavior" in his own home and NOT for falsely reporting his laptop stolen? I'm afraid that every school administrator involved in this act of spying should go to jail for some time and be forbidden to ever work with children again.

UPDATE 2/20: This article defines the improper behavior, "an official mistook a piece of candy for a pill and thought he was selling drugs." How exactly does that relate to a stolen laptop? Meanwhile, the school defends itself by contradicting the parents. They also contradicted themselves. They first claimed that the software had never been activated, and now say it's been used in 42 cases of stolen laptops.

Politics: I'm not sure why anyone is listening to that quitter Palin, the Democratic party needs a spine immediately, the stimulus DID create jobs and lower the job loss rate, and if health care isn't overhauled within the next year or so the premature deaths of hundreds of thousands of Americans will be one the hands of our congresscritters, who right now take so much money from the health insurance lobby that they might as well consider themselves paid assassins for health insurance. An aside: Republicans are great at winning elections, but lousy at actually running the country. Democrats are horrible at winning elections, but can't run the country without a supermajority. Ug.

Olympics: I don't care what anyone says, I love Curling. And the Simpsons got it so very wrong that I kind of wish they hadn't bothered (although the pin-collecting side plot was funny). I've also enjoyed watching the other sports, although the crashes have made me cringe and shudder more or less constantly. The weather conditions in Vancouver no more prove global climate change than the snow on the East Coast disproves it, but it sure is more evidence of something totally out of whack in our weather. I'm much more upset by NBC's decision to delay their coverage of the Games 3 hours for the West Coast, WHERE THE GAMES ARE HAPPENING, so we see all the results online before the events are shown on any local channel. NBC really screwed up this one.

Entertainment: I've got more to say about DC Comics than can fit in a summary, but I think the change in leadership is not a terrible thing, and will wait and see. I'm looking forward to Brightest Day because of the promised Aquaman content, but I expect to be disappointed. In other entertainment, can hardly wait for new Doctor Who to start up. And I'm still in training for Emerald City Comicon, which requires me to get lots of walking in.

I must give an annoyed shout out to Aaron Williams who directed me to this page of free downloads of the old Command and Conquer games. I'm utterly addicted to the original game, and I love just blowing up pixels. It's a lovely waste of time, but unfortunately I had more important things I should have been doing (if I'd had the brainpower to do them). Oh Aaron, you have hurt me so!

Um, that's all I can think of for now. I'm sure I'm forgetting stuff, but this is more like a real blog post than anything I've done in months, so I'm signing off.

Yay, Rio!

Rio is hosting the 2016 Olympics. Yay! Hubby-Eric will be happy, he was rooting for them from the start.

A Sunday Review

You know, I didn't really watch any TV this week. Not really. We had TV at the hotel, but I didn't find myself interested. I didn't read much, I'm still tackling Eric's Olympic book, which is a slow but interesting read. But I'm not nearly done with it yet. I've spent most of my time researching appliances and worrying about getting my house. So this review is basically: there's not much to review this week. It was an non-entertainment week.

A New Week, Some More Links

Poirot and Zucchini and Bread. The comments are lots of fun. I want to make Zucchini cookies now.

Kobe Bryant likes dark comics.

Metafilter links to some intense audio from a runaway train. Spoiler: no one dies, but the engineer was blamed despite staying on the train to warn people at level crossings, when he could've jumped off earlier.

Calorie Counting: why restaurants ought to be required to post calorie counts. Calorie Counts: why restaurants shouldn't be required to post calorie counts.

Speaking of food, that may not be the fish you think it is. Two teenagers discover through DNA testing that various types of sushi aren't what was advertised.

Your printer is lying to you.

How we trust people.

Michael Sensei celebrates Ozma's birthday.

Here's a great article about a science teacher trying to overcome ignorance in the Bible Belt. And on that topic, Evolution: 24 myths and misconceptions.

Green Lantern watches the Olympics. And while the Closing Ceremonies didn't seem to be faked, there is an accusation that the arrangements for national anthems were stolen by Chinese musicians.

Pug Recall (from the Onion).

Another Linkdump

Comic Book Urban Legends Revealed #169: Marvel, Death of Aquaman, Wild Wild West.

Polite Scott looks at Doctor's Head Mirrors.

Want.

How to make really simple garden lights for a single use (like a party) out of LEDs, coin batteries, and mason jars.

For stupid customers: the lollipop policy.

An idea for electric cars: stations quickly replace the batteries instead of recharging them.

Duh, not handholds. From the comments: "As a commercial pilot I can assure you that those instruments are clearly labeled. That one MAY have had the markings, Warning hot, and No Handhold, and No Step. Probably at least two of those markings, possibly all three." TSA inspectors should NOT be illiterate. And it's a good thing the airline re-inspected the planes, or that TSA flunkie could've murdered hundreds of people. In the name of "security". I think the TSA should be grounded and replaced with something useful and intelligent.

Diebold admits their voting machines are crap. PAPER AND PENS. Voting on a closed source voting machine is as good as throwing away your vote.

Computer junkie finds apparent proof that China lied about the age of some of its Olympic athletes.

Olympic Logos over the years.

Lovecraft fan harassed when paying respects at Lovecraft's grave.


It's Pug Attack! Beach pugs! Jailed pug! Stroller Pug! Tough pug! (been there, done that) Authoritative Pug! and Snuggle Puggle!

Wow... Evil Twin only needs $55 more to reach $500 in the MS 150! If you've got $5 to spare, you can donate, or just watch to see if she makes it.

A Linkdump

The sad news of The Real World. I haven't acknowledged this yet, but I've been well aware of the Greenberger's loss. I'd been following Bob Greenberger's blog, and hoping Robbie would pull through.

The water myth. Not everyone needs tons of water while exercising. I think the final sentence really sums the article up. Runners have died of too much water, but none from dehydration.

The Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest 2008 Results.

And also, the 2012 Beloit College Mindset List.

I have visions of baby sea turtles swarming around poor diners' legs.

Websnark looks at Starslip Crisis, one of my new favorite webcomics. I met Straub at Emerald City Comicon, and have been faithfully reading his strip ever since.

The Pirate Bay renamed itself temporarily for the Olympics.

Shredding isn't environmentally friendly. So shred carefully.

That's a new version of the ferries are running.

For the in-laws: The pugs missing after a robbery were safely found. Whew. The Seattle 911 blog indicated that she wouldn't press charges, as long as they came back safely.

And lastly, my Evil Twin will be trying to ride her bike 150 miles for charity this September. If you want to help Lisa in the MS 150 then donate here. She's trying to get $500 in donations so she can get a jersey, and thanks to current donations she's made the limit she needed to be allowed to ride.

Phelps and Cavic

I'm naturally very interested in Michael "Aquaman" Phelps seventh gold medal (in the 100m Butterfly), in which he just barely beat out Milorad Cavic at the wall. Cavic's only mistake was gliding into the wall instead of taking a final stroke like Phelps. It was literally too close for human eyes to see the difference in real time. Even in super slow motion, it's hard to tell. Only when you take into account that Cavic's head comes up at the end while Phelps is still driving hard to the wall does the finish make sense.

As for Cavic, he's pleased with the result. His blog states as much:

On winning a SILVER medal: I am completely happy, and still in complete disbelief that I was able to achieve this feat! I’m not joking... It's a tough loss, but I'm on cloud nine. I congratulated Phelps and his coach Bob Bowman. I'm just glad the race was fun to watch for everyone. It was a pleasure for me, really.

Filing a Protest: Yes, as you all saw, I almost won the Gold, and if you ask me, the clock does not lie. I had nothing to do with this filing, and neither did my coach Mike Bottom. This is just another attack on my coach who has done never wronged anyone in swimming, except coach foreign athletes (non-Americans) to Olympic medals. You all have to understand that any coach would have done this for their swimmer if there were any possibility of error, but I’m sorry to disappoint, it was my Olympic committee and swimming staff who did the filing. We're not "sour grapes" and we're not "pissed"... If you ask me, it should be accepted and we should move on. I've accepted defeat, and there's nothing wrong with losing to the greatest swimmer there has ever been.

Frankly, Cavic is one classy guy. His blog proves it.


I've watched two YouTube videos that show the finish from different angles in super slo-mo (I would link to them, but they are being pulled as quickly as the IOC can find them), but I wasn't convinced about Phelps' victory until I saw a series of still photographs at Sports Illustrated in which you can see Phelps right hand touching just before Cavic. Again, so close... 1/100th of a second. If it were my choice, both men would get gold medals. There's a good reason I'm not in charge of the Olympics.


I grew up a fan of Mark Spitz for his seven medals in my favorite events of the Olympics. Well, Mark Spitz weighs in on Phelps' seventh Gold, and he expresses relief. He should have been invited to the Games to see Phelps, but wasn't. I blame US Olympic officials for the oversight.

I just watched Phelps and his team win Phelps' eighth Gold medal of the Games. VERY impressive, especially Jason Lezak's anchor swim. Phelps wasn't so bad himself, giving the team the lead in the third leg. He certainly earned those medals.


One last thought. I curse the cheaters who make me worry and wonder if we'll someday become disappointed in Phelps or his team. I believe they are clean, but there is that tiny doubt and worry. It's nearly impossible to have heroes in the sports world anymore because of all the people who cheat. So curse the cheaters for making me doubt. The sporting world has been tainted by drug-addled scumbags. And I hate feeling that way.

Olympic Linkdump

First off, I want to say that I remember. I haven't forgotten at all what happened in China, nor will I forget Tiananmen Square. I don't forgive the leadership of China for what they did and what they continue to do. At the moment, though, I live in a glass house as far as human rights are concerned, so my outrage is tempered by the sick knowledge that my own country is as guilty in many areas as China is. In addition, the Olympics are about the athletes, and the unattainable goal of world peace. I watch the Olympics because I believe we can and will rise above all the petty politics someday. I watch the Olympics because I hope.

Which is not to say I can't be snarky about them...

Confused by the new scoring in the Olympics? Here's an article about it.

Rob Riggle in China.

One of the things I actually liked about the Opening Ceremonies, the footprints of fireworks, were faked. So it was a technical achievement, just not the one I thought. I recall being impressed/startled that the fireworks were being launched with traffic on the street... something that in retrospect really should've clued me into the fakery. I'm far more disappointed in the media for not alerting the audience of the deception than I am that I was fooled by it.

They also faked a singer because they thought the best singer wasn't cute enough. Style over honesty. Truly China has become a modern nation.

Looking into the past, Heidi Krieger, an Olympic champion from East Germany, tells what happened after his Olympic experiences thanks to the cheating that East Germany did without the althletes' knowledge. And no, "his" is not a typo.

Silver Age Comics looks at the Olympics in Comic Books, including one of Aquaman's references to the Olympics. One that isn't mentioned is when a Chinese athlete "adds his points" to the American team during WWII, thus showing the friendship between the two countries in "Champion in War!"

Yeah, I like Michael Phelps. He's the single most flexible human I've ever seen (seriously, watch the underwater view while he's doing the butterfly, wow!). Go Aquaman!

A Sunday Review

TV this week:

• Ghost Hunters International: "Shattered Spirit" - While the picture was interesting, I couldn't describe it as a ghost. The sounds they heard... well, despite everything they still might have been the house settling. And I just don't know about the EVPs or the doll falling. But I'm still not convinced with this one.
• Big Daddy's House: "Boy's Night In" - A promising start for the next Food Network Star winner. I like his son. And the food looked pretty good, too.
• Iron Chef America: "Morimoto vs Ophaso" - No contest on this one, but there's no way you could get me to eat any of those foods.
• Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives: "Where the Locals Eat" - Oh man, I'd love to try those crab cakes and hushpuppies at the first place. And I want to try the french toast at the third place. I'm not a chicken fan, so the second place did nothing for me.
• American Gladiators: "The Winners Are Declared" - I missed most of the season because Eric wanted to watch the Maria show, but I really didn't miss much, except the introduction of some new events. And hey, I got to see the final episode.
• Ghost Hunters International: "Hauntings of South Africa" - This one was a good example of how easy it is for people to fool themselves. Some good debunking went on, but they still declared the place haunted based on EVPs. The prison was interesting, but Barry is about as trustworthy a witness as Brian.
• Olympics Opening Ceremonies - We TiVo'ed the CBC coverage, and it wasn't bad overall. The parade of nations was chopped up a bit by ads, which often happens, and of course once the Canadians came in they spent too much time interviewing Canadian Olympians who all basically said they same thing and not enough covering the other nations. The spectacle was impressive as usual. The drumming was particularly cool, as was the moveable type. The lighting of the flame was also excellent. And I liked the footprint fireworks walking to the stadium. Now: sports. I wish we weren't moving, we would be able to see more of the events.
• Food Detectives: "Double Dippers" - I never thought double dipping was so bad. Yuck. I knew why you should start with cold water when boiling, but I didn't know that trick with the onions. As for ginger help with motion sickness... it doesn't seem to help a lot, just a little. But maybe I should invest in some ginger pills anyway.
• Ace of Cakes: "Pandamonium" - The panda cake was really impressive. It's like the first cake they ever made that just seemed to go right all the way through. But I really want a deep dish Chicago Pizza cake, chocolate, for myself.

Comics this week:

• Doctor Who Classics #9 - I'd forgotten about the old abbot and the jelly babies. For that matter, I'd forgotten who the baddies of the story were. It was fun to read this again.
• Final Crisis #3 - New Aquaman? What was wrong with the old ones? *sigh* I wanted to like this, but the more I read, the less I enjoy it.
• Jonah Hex #34 - What an incredibly depressing story.
• Detective Comics #847 - Would this story be any better if I knew who Hush was? Or cared?

Past Sunday Reviews -- Comics at Amazon.com -- Previews

Linkdump

There's an eclipse tomorrow.

I need this book.

A whole blog of Cake Wrecks.

DJ Coffman will draw for you, if you've got $2 to spare.

Brave and the Bold preview.

Tom Beland explains where he's been, then shares some reader feedback.

Mail Order Comics Review.

The World's First Computer displayed the Olympic Calendar.

I wonder if I can grow this in Eastern Washington?

Diane Duane on getting rid of the plastic bag. Seattle is also trying to introduce legislation to reduce the use of plastic shopping bags. Also, Diane Duane's book, The Big Meow is up to chapter seven, free on-line.

I'm not a fan of Critical Mass, in general. I think too many of the riders go out looking for trouble, and it gives all bicyclists (myself included) a bad name. That said, I'm not sure what happened in this Seattle incident, because both sides give different stories. Either the driver got angry and ran over cyclists, THEN was attacked... or he was being attacked without provocation and ran over cyclists trying to escape. Either way, both the cyclists and the driver should've been booked, not just the cyclists. There is no doubt that the driver ran over bikes, and that's assault with a deadly weapon.

More Linkages

Guerrilla Clockmakers fix Historic Paris Clock. WAY cool. The Museum of Hoaxes calls it A Perfect Prank.

Another WGA Strike Video (YouTube), a Love Story. Via Marv.

A First-Hand Report of the session on the Flying Spaghetti Monster at the religious society's meeting.

A wonderful editorial speaks of the silliness of the Gordon Lee trial (in which a retailer accidently gave a comic portraying nudity to a child on Free Comic Book Day). I'm linking to the Newsarama article because they've included (thanks to Bully!) a picture of the statue which has Romulus and Remus' doodles out in plain sight.

The Bible is not a sweet little book.

Two of the 2010 Olympic Mascots are very cryptozoologically related. A sasquatch and the thunderbird. Cool.

JFK's death, the Zapruder film, and a matter of timing (NY Times).

Geek and Proud has a funny slant on the death by booze meme.

Hmmm, I think I want one.

The Watchmen Blog has pictures from the Watchmen set.

Disney erases history after being criticized by teacher.

Bothell High School has a big game coming up. It won't be down at the bottom of the hill, though, as it's the State Final, so it's in the Tacoma Dome (the breast of the West).

Amok Cats:

And a pug for the in-laws.

Some Links

Literary Freedom (via H&R).:

He ruled, in effect, that only readers had the right to censor publications - by simply refusing to buy or read any that offended them.

When I have a baby, I want one of these.

Top Gear has Darth Vader, a Cyberman, Ming the Merciless, a Klingon, and a Dalek race the same car.

Wow. I suddenly have no desire to see The Dark Is Rising movie at all. I read the books awhile ago, before I heard of the movie, and enjoyed them a lot. Hat tip to TangognaT.

I'm not sure what to think of the double-amputee runner who is making waves by trying to qualify for the Olympics.

Links

I've got a lot of blogs to try to read and catch up on, and a whole lot of links I want to check out. So here's some ones I've found for the moment. More later.

LOL Doctor Who: The Lost Frisbee. The Many Moods of Oods. Invisibles.

Paul Cornell on his Doctor Who story.

Congrats to Anna for her new store. I hope hubby-Eric and I can stop by on our trip this summer.

If you like Girl Genius, check out Othar Tryggvassen's Twitter Adventures.

I like Elayne's Corny Solution.

If you have a cat that likes to jump on your keyboard, this is for you.

Great reviews of movie trailers by pal Dorian.

You Tube Links:

• Goonies of the Caribbean.
• Steam Trek: The Moving Picture. I know I've seen it before, but it's worth checking out again.
• Women in Art.

Oh. My.

Recordings of Concert Intermissions. Interesting. As a musician, I would be fascinated to hear this.

This is me.

An unusual vacation. I think I wouldn't mind trying it, but not working there.

The Bad Astronomer is a Firefly Fan.

Canadian souvenir is really expensive.

I can understand the cheering ban, but denying diplomas to people who get cheered? Couldn't some jerk arrange to make sure someone doesn't get a diploma just by getting people to cheer for them? It's a stupid punishment aimed at the wrong people.

That's one of the ugliest logos I've ever seen. I like the alternate further down in the article MUCH better.

Um. Duh? Put wheels on kids shoes, some kids will be stupid and end up in hospital. Some kids won't be stupid and will still end up with broken bones. Why is this "news"?

Random Thoughts

Couldn't get through all the links I wanted to post, so I'll finish tomorrow if I have the time...

Self-Link #1: Grassroots promotion of Aquaman.

Self-Link #2: It is time once again to remind you of our eBay auctions. If it has "KBTC" in the description, all proceeds are going to the local PBS station. If it doesn't, all proceeds are going to pay our bills.

Colleen Doran Sees Wicked then flaunts her stuff at the DC offices.

Heidi Meeley applies "The Customer Is Always Right" to the comic book industry.

Ten in Green. Remember the Alamo.

Pictures from Wondercon.

I got my monster, thanks to Adventures in Applied Math. Apparently, Tegan eats townsfolk and abducts geeks. Hrm.

Speaking of monsters... mmmmmmm Chocolate Dalek. It looks REALLY messy. Yum.

With March came a tiny bit of spare money, some of which went to Conlan Press to buy The Last Unicorn DVD.

FilkerTom on naked actors and stupid commentators.

If you haven't checked out Strange Maps yet, you really ought to. All kinds of neat stuff there, from Oz to the DCU and back again.

I don't really care much about this news item, except I do hope the press gets to ask the perp one single question: WHY?

After several days of not moving, the Leif Erikson statue finally was successfully removed to be renovated and moved to a slightly different location.

Hmmm, I think I'd actually watch this.

I Park Like An Idiot dot com, where you can get bumper stickers to put on the cars of people who can't park in between the lines. I don't think I'd have the nerve to actually apply one of these, but I am amused by the thought.

Reading Scriptures leads to Violence.

Don't use the words winter, games, or gold in Vancouver BC for the next few years. More from Boing Boing.

Oz and Ends tells us what a "baramin" is.

Junk science from the RIAA.

Duct Tape comes in handy.

We still don't understand ball lightning.

9-year-old Canadian Terrorist detained by the US.

Diebold may dump e-voting unit because it's tarnished their reputation. Well, duh. Creating easily hackable voting machines with no paper trail would tarnish any company's reputation.

Garrett wants us to remember what a jury REALLY is. As a juror, you have the right to judge both the criminal AND the law. It's called Jury Nullification, and judges don't want you to know about it.

You must know your rights! Because, once selected for jury duty, nobody will inform you of your power to judge both law and fact. In fact, the judge's instructions to the jury may be to the contrary. Another quote from US vs Dougherty (cited earlier): "The fact that there is widespread existence of the jury's prerogative, and approval of its existence as a necessary counter to case-hardened judges and arbitrary prosecutors, does not establish as an imperative that the jury must be informed by the judge of that power".

For St Patrick's Day: Oh Danny Boy, as performed by three of the best evah Muppet singers. Don't get yer hopes up.

Linkdump

500 Chickens on a sticky note.

Len Wein is Blogging.

Bully is off to London. I'm jealous, except for the flying part. I don't like flying.

Dave has a Christmas Card for all his readers. From Superman's brother, no less. Go check it out.

Augie has a rumor: Amazon.com plans to sell downloads of DRM-free MP3s! This would be a very good thing for people who want to be able to use music they download in whatever player they own.

Speaking of DRM, the BBC is thinking of releasing popular shows via the Azureus network, Zudeo. The shows will be DRM-crippled and only available through Zudeo... which makes them pretty much useless to me.

PlateWire is getting more coverage. I wonder how long it'll be before somebody sues them for defamation?

Canadian Women's Ski Jumpers are really peeved at the IOC and the international ski jumping officials who have decided that women can't compete in the sport in the 2010 Olympics. Even worse is one of the reasons given for the exclusion: "it's medically unfit for women to be ski jumpers, which is a great one that didn't go over well with everyone, that it's just too dangerous for women — even though you have women aerials, women skeleton, luge, bobsled."

Komodo Dragon Virgin Birth!

Well, the new windstorm still hasn't hit, but I'm worried about my parents who have been without power since Thursday. If the next storm complicates repairs, they won't have power on Christmas. Oh well, at least they aren't in Denver.