Some new pictures added to the trusty photo-gallery, mostly in the Oh Canada section (though there’s a new picture on the critters page, too—of spinoni at a dog show in Harrisburg). The windmilly pictures are of a wind-farm in Canada, and the coast/forest pictures are from various sites, mostly along the coast of Maine and Canada.
Quicklinks
- News: “Duke University is eliminating 8 a.m. classes and trying to come up with other ways help its sleep-deprived students, who too often are struggling to survive on a mix of caffeine, adrenaline, and ambition.” Hurrah, hurrah, hurrah. News you can appreciate, if not actually benefit from.(via Boglo)
- Some low-impact living initiative fact sheets. Good stuff. (via MeFi)
- Not that we necessarily needed to have access to this, but it’s kinda fun to see (read, at least) bathroom graffiti from bathrooms around the country (or world, whatever). (via MeFi)
- The Association of Alternative Newsweeklies has an interesting memo written by a U.S official in Iraq. You should, how do they say it, read the asparagus, it’s good for you.
- And another big cheese at McDonald’s bites the dust; like the last one, he (the person who brought the franchise to Japan) is killed by a heart attack.
Posted by Ben on April 28, 2004
https://www.swordbilled.com/quicklinks/
Memorandum
Told Lavinia, look: the pictures are out, what d’you want us to do. Said Ell, we aren’t a young man anymore, we aren’t like we used to be. And things, other things aren’t the same either. It’s no longer like we can what wave a hand and have somebody here doing something’s for us anymore.
Posted by Ben on April 27, 2004
https://www.swordbilled.com/memorandum/
It’s the ol’ “what-movie-do-you-belong-in” quiz
…and the answer, apropos of my earlier post today, is:
Go ahead and take the What movie Do you Belong in?(many different outcomes!) quiz. It will cure what ails you and bring a peaceful resolution to the world’s problems*.
* Some restrictions may apply
Posted by Ben on April 27, 2004
https://www.swordbilled.com/its-the-ol-what-movie-do-you-belong-in-quiz/
Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk
…because you couldn’t decide whether or not you really wanted to read this book.
Yeah, right.
So, um, yeah, a great book, this Fight Club. Hands-down (well, almost—I’m not sure about Americana) this is the best first novel I’ve ever read, i.e., the best “this-is-so-and-so’s-first-novel” book, so-and-so in this case being Chuck Palahniuk. Brilliant, really. I’ve read Survivor, Lullaby, and Choke, and thought they were all swell but. This book’s kinda like the grandaddy of them, and so scores some points in originality. Which isn’t to say that the others aren’t original in their own way, but some of the conventions (sorry, can’t think of a better word) get re-used, whereas they’re fresh and crisp in FC. Why? I don’t know.
But it’s great. The word frenetic comes to mind. The pacing in this book is absolutely ridiculously genius. You pick up the book and start reading, and right away it’s:
“Tyler gets me a job as a waiter, after that Tyler’s pushing a gun in my mouth and saying, the first step to eternal life is you have to die. For a long time though, Tyler and I were best friends. People are always asking, did I know about Tyler Durden.” (page 1 [or whatever; the first page of the story, I don’t think it’s page one—okay, so it’s page 11])
Anyway, FC the Movie is remarkably faithful to the book, which, if you happened to like the movie, is a good thing. If not, keep in mind that the book does a better job than the movie at most things, visual representation not being one of them. But if you haven’t? Read this book. You’ll thank me or you won’t.
Posted by Ben on April 27, 2004
https://www.swordbilled.com/fight-club-by-chuck-palahniuk-review/
Feel… strangely… compelled… to… like… Australia…
Posted by Ben on April 26, 2004
https://www.swordbilled.com/feel-strangely-compelled-to-like-australia/
Patterns of Thought re: Global Dimming
“Goodbye Sunshine” is a Guardian article that keeps turning up in the oddest places. It was picked up by Slashdot sometime close to the original publication. MeFi seems to latch on to it from time to time (I can’t find the other time, but I know it’s there), too. And it’s even found itself a home in the ‘external sources’ section of a Wikipedia article on global dimming.
(So what’s the article say? Oh, nothing much—just that the amount of the sun’s (that’s the bright thing in the sky that you’re not supposed to look at) energy reaching earth has declined approximately 3% every 10 years, for a 10% total decrease in solar energy over the past 30 years.)
In fairness, it’s a very good and important article, and you should probably read it. So here I am, linking to it. Oh well. So much for forgoing the bandwagon.
(via Guardian: “Goodbye Sunshine” by David Adam [December 18, 2003] and other linked sources)
Posted by Ben on April 26, 2004
https://www.swordbilled.com/patterns-of-thought-re-global-dimming/
All around the world in 360 degrees
Taking a giant leap forward from the quote-unquote ‘traditional’ quicktime virtual-reality offerings—boxes that were like at most two inches wide, these tiny spaces that offered a vague sense of control in that you could pan around 360°—Fullscreen QTVR has some imagery that is quite frankly amazing. Everything from the top of Mt. Everest to the streets of Paris to sarcophagal tombs to, e.g., the $1-million-whatever Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren. Which, if you’re in to that sort of thing, are pretty interesting. Some of them even offer sound.
(via CSM: “QTVR takes a giant leap forward” by Jim Reagan [April 21, 2004])
Posted by Ben on April 25, 2004
https://www.swordbilled.com/all-around-the-world-in-360-degrees/
O heavy lightness!
I’ve always said, “if only I had the complete text of Romeo and Juliet on a bedsheet—or maybe on a shower curtain—I might come to appreciate it more.”
Finally.
Posted by Ben on April 24, 2004
https://www.swordbilled.com/o-heavy-lightness/
The better to see you with
Hale said the 57-pound calf is friendly, likes to drink milk from its mother and enjoys lapping up water by using both tongues.
(via Local6/AP: “Three-Eyed, Double-Mouthed Calf In Good Health” [April 21, 2004])
Posted by Ben on April 23, 2004
https://www.swordbilled.com/the-better-to-see-you-with/