My mom is from Central Africa went to college in Cape Town, South Africa. Being in Africa, she went on many safaris. She mentioned to me that once she was traveling through some nature park during marula fruit season. Marula fruit is a tree fruit that animals really like. It falls off the tree and a variety of animals eat it and then it ferments in their bodies and they become drunk. Really. Anyway, Mom saw an elephant that apparently had a nasty hangover and while normally elephants are pretty docile keep-to-themselves kind of creatures, this guy was really angry and attempted to flip over a van with his tusks. It was a terrifying moment and difficult to watch. I believed her, but I didn’t expect to see anything like it in my lifetime. Well, thank God for YouTube, bringing drunken sub-Saharan animal footage to all of us. Please to enjoy.
Archive for the ‘Teh Intarwebz’ Category
Storytime.
Wednesday, August 27th, 2008Excellent animation.
Friday, July 25th, 2008B. sent me this, and I think it’s really terrific. It keeps your interest the entire time.
An animated version of an interview with John Lennon.
Two songs that are forever altered in my mind.
Tuesday, July 8th, 20081. I do not, as a rule, care for Mariah Carey’s music. It’s just not my cup of tea. However, I listen to a great deal of pop or R&B stations, and they play her stuff. So I know it. I know some lyrics and everything. She has a cover of a song called “Without You”.
“American Idol” is not unique. Bulgaria has “Bulgarian Idol”. And they have the same audition process, with the talented people. And the not-so-talented people.
This is a video of a woman auditioning on “Bulgarian Idol”. “Without You” is ruined, RUINED, in my mind forever. The phrase that she is massacring that causes me to crack up every time is, “Can’t live, if living is without you…”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_RgL2MKfWTo
2. If you remember back a ways, there was a song on the radio every fifteen minutes called “Torn” by Natalie Imbruglia. You could not avoid it. You could not hide from it. It was all-pervasive. A British comedian heard the song and came up with a mimed act based on the song that is BRILLIANT. Now, I can be falling asleep and my clock radio will play that song and I have to roll over onto my back and mime all the motions I can remember. Every time. Luckily the song doesn’t come on the radio very often, but when it does, I must mime. I cannot resist.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xAUQMeVw-ck
And a bonus: Here’s Natalie Imbruglia performing the miming with him! What a good sport.
NPR and Jonathan Coulton.
Monday, June 23rd, 2008I was going to write this past week about my travels to Israel, but I got slammed with a project that ate my head and digested it from Monday to Friday until I was a crispy frayed exoskeleton of myself. I was so busy I didn’t even get a chance to check my emails all week. Brutal, I tell you. But the project got done and went nicely and all is hunky-dory, so now I can return to the world of the living and tell you about my recent activities. And I’m editing my Israel photos to share with you as well, so there will be a plethora of posting in the next few days. Rejoice, three readers, rejoice!
I drove my parents to the airport on Saturday so they could fly out to California, and on the way back I listened to their radio. My dad has two stations in his presents: WQXR, the classical music station, and NPR, the… NPR station. On Saturday WQXR plays opera all afternoon, which I really don’t care for at all, so I listened to NPR. I realized something that I’ve been fighting for a long time. I don’t like NPR. I want to like NPR, I really do, it’s just they’re just such drowse-inducing intellectuals, I crave to listen to all of Eminem’s albums back to back afterwards. Traffic was backed up so I got to listen for two and a half hours. Because Albert Hofmann had just died (the inventor of LSD), they played an hour of psychedelic music, all of which I could name in the first two beats (yay me!) The songs were: Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds, Magic Carpet Ride, Purple Haze, White Rabbit, and White Room. The DJ talked about his magic mushroom trip where he discovered the meaning of life in his vomit, and that was all fine. Then came on All Things Considered. Here’s where NPR proved themselves (once again) to be the most grating thing on earth. Andrea Seabrook did a ten-minute piece on the tomato salmonella outbreak where she interviewed… her mother. And they chatted about tomatoes being a pivotal part of their lives. For ten minutes. In those voices that they speak in. These voices. I wanted to shoot myself. Patton Oswalt (my most favorite comedian in the whole wide world) does a thing about NPR on his DVD, Feelin’ Kinda Patton, that is just BRILLIANT. Rent the DVD if you can. It’s about fifteen minutes in. He sums up my response far better than I can.
Addendum: I found a clip of the Patton Oswalt NPR thing on the YouTubes! Hurray!
On Saturday evening I went into the city to see Jonathan Coulton with B. and his wife D. and their son K. It was in the Highline Ballroom in the Meatpacking District, which is one of my least visited parts of Manhattan for three reasons: One, even though they hose down the sidewalks, you can still smell the rotting blood faintly in the air; Two, it’s become very trendy so everyone is young and hip and thin and I feel like a troll doll with fluffy orange hair whose ass is impaled on a fifth-grader’s pencil, and; Three, there are cobblestones all over. I am super-clumsy and I fall down on plain old asphalt, so I suppose on cobblestones I fall down, shatter and then burst into flames or something. But I like Jonathan Coulton very much, so I braved the hipsters and meat-funk and cobbles and somehow made it to our dinner destination, and I’m glad I did, because it was phenomenal. Really. It’s called Highline, and it’s a Thai fusion restaurant. The decor was lovely, the food was delicious and plentiful and not expensive, the iced tea with lychees was nummy, the waitresses were nice and friendly, it was just great. I also recommend that if you go there, go early, because we went at 5:00 and by the time we left, it was half-full. One can only imagine how packed it gets at 8:00. It’s on Washington Street between 13th Street and Little 12th.
Then we went to the concert. I don’t much care for live music (uncomfortable chairs, loud, etc.) but this had to be one of the best concerts ever. Really. Everyone had a good time: the audience, the performers, everybody was just thrilled to be there. The opening act (Paul and Storm) performed for about an hour and were amazing and funny, and then Jonathan performed for a hour and a bit and was terrific as well. He had eight people performing behind him playing ukeleles (the Kristen Shirts Ukelele Army, I believe they were called) and at one point they also played kazoos. And you could sit at tables and have dessert items and no one stood and blocked your view, a fantabulous time was had by all.
If you are a geek, especially a computer programmer/video game player geek, you must discover Jonathan Coulton. Here are some of his finest works:
http://www.jonathancoulton.com/primer/listen/
I recommend “Code Monkey”, “I Crush Everything” (I found out at the concert it is a song about a squid who hates himself, which might be the greatest idea for a song in history), and “Mandlebrot Set”. They don’t have my favorite song there, “I Feel Fantastic”, but you can buy his music on his website, you don’t even have to brush your hair or interact with other humans. Bonus!
Major shout out to one of my newest readers, J. George, who is on bed rest for the next bunch of weeks due to ultra-uber-pregnant with twins. Good luck J. and enjoy this nice quiet time to yourself.
Today, a movie review and a totally rad video.
Tuesday, April 8th, 2008I saw the film The Hours, the one where Nicole Kidman is wearing a fake nose and she won an Oscar for her role, blah blah blah. If you have a choice between watching this film and poking yourself in the eye with a straw, go with the straw. It’s a literary chick flick, meaning they use big words and philosophical ideas, but they’re still whiny and moody. And there’s way too many women kissing in this film. Two of the characters are lesbian lovers, so that’s fine, but in one scene a woman kisses her neighbor right out of the blue (…alright, then) and in one scene a woman kisses her sister (NOT alright then). And while these are full-lip-action kisses, they’re not terribly sensual at all, so guys, don’t get excited. I’m a big fan of non-traditional arty movies, but this one is boring and tedious. I’m starting to think I just hate the kinds of movies Julianne Moore is in. I didn’t like Magnolia (everybody in that movie needs to shut the hell up), and I’m looking through her IMDB file… nope, not a big fan of the films of hers that I’ve seen. I will use her as a warning sign from now on. “Oh, Julianne Moore is in that movie? I probably won’t like it then.” Save myself some time.
I saw this today on CuteOverload, and I think everyone needs to see it. It’s only 40 seconds long, but I would watch an hour and a half of it, and then I would like it more than The Hours.
I must be in Hawaii, ‘cuz look at all this spam! (Hey, they can’t all be winners.)
Thursday, March 27th, 2008I love watching the evolution of spam, as you three readers well know. Now the spammers are clearly just looking through dictionaries to try to find random words and they are picking just the BEST fake names. Here, allow me to give you a sampling:
Maury Hardy
octavian apastron caribbee gadzooks sidenote crannog apocryphalness monotheist
Dixie Mendez
outmantle drukpa thinginess multirotation gyracanthus disguisal els osteophytic
Kermit Chaney
paxillary neurilemmal sublime horned duchess moltenly underprivileged prestimulus
Sterling Sargent
thermoelectricity chairmaker typometry semishirker barbarical chilitis benefactor myoid
It reminds me of those make-yer-own-poetry magnets that were so popular in the 90s. I’m particularly partial to the “sublime horned duchess” who is “moltenly underprivileged”. That must suck for her.
I’ve been working freelance in the city lately, and I must admit it isn’t the greatest commute from the ‘burbs (an hour and a half, door to door). But as I’m approaching the office, I am greeted by this sculpture everyday and it makes me so happy:
An owl! It’s like they knew I would be working here and they put that there just for me! New York is so thoughtful sometimes.
Addition: I left work late the other night, and get this: the owl’s eyes have green lights in them and at night they blink on and off! Green lights! Demonic owl sculpture! I… I don’t even have words for my joy.
I must have this.
Friday, February 29th, 2008In my perusings of The Internette, I found this picture, and now I must find these bathroom signs, for they are so very rad:
Find these for me, and you will be most handsomely rewarded. Well, I’ll pay whatever they cost. But I’ll be really really happy and that’s a reward in itself. Kinda.
Apparently I wasn’t done yet.
Thursday, February 28th, 2008So, in the movie Helvetica (see previous post), one type enthusiast talks about how before Helvetica came on the scene, all the ads were done in handwritten, jaunty-looking type. Everything. See?
Right now I’m working one some horror stuff for a client, and I found the poster for The Birds, the Alfred Hitchcock movie. And suddenly I understood the problem with this style of typesetting.
You know what this poster says to me? “Birds are attacking that lady… and the circus is in town!” Totally wrong type choice. And why are there quotes around the title? It’s like, “They’re not really birds… They’re weasels we tied wings to and threw at her head! Blahahahaha!” If only they knew they could make any horror film look horror-y by having a stark sans-serif font on a black background. Example:
Except for the “The Night HE Came Home!” part (oogie boogie boogie boo), this is a very scary ad. Thank God for Helvetica, or we’d still be looking at irritatingly jaunty-fonted ads.
Typefaces and fonts and letters, oh my!
Tuesday, February 26th, 2008Last night I watched a documentary called “Helvetica”. I learned an important lesson, and that is some designers REALLY care about typefaces. I mean, REALLY care. As in they will only use one for all their projects, ever. And Helvetica is often that one. In the movie they show a variety of places Helvetica is used. I really had no idea how popular it was.
The Gap, Target, American Apparel, Crate and Barrel, Con Edison, all the subway signs in New York, Panasonic, American Airlines, Jeep, Energizer batteries, your federal income tax returns… and that’s just in America.
In 2007, Helvetica turned 50, so happy birthday to Helvetica! You are functional and legible and squat.
I, on the other hand, am not married to any particular typeface. It’s easier for me to list the ones I hate because there are so few of them (Comic Sans, I’m looking right at you…). The other day a client found a font they thought was peppy and appropriate for their presentation, and I saw it at Emigre fonts and bought it. It’s called Filosofia Unicase.
It’s mighty peppy, isn’t it? I like it a great deal. I was unfamiliar with the concept of unicase, meaning all the letters are the same height. It looks charming and tidy at the same time. And all those guys in the Helvetica movie are muffling their screams in pillows at this font.
While at Emigre I saw another font I liked and I bought it too. It’s even peppier then Filosofia Unicase (“You hear that, Helvetica guys?” “AAHHHHH!!!”) I think it’s called Democratica.
Look! It’s got points sticking out of random parts of the letter! And the capital “Y” is so weird! I feel so counter-culture with my wacky fonts! Wheee! I think perhaps I need to get out more.
A big weekend. One might call it Giant. Also, spam.
Monday, February 4th, 2008I receive a great deal of spam on this website. These are the titles of the last four spammy messages:
Kyjasghg
Ytnfskvu
Wwxukkrf
Bwhjeawz
I feel like they’re not trying anymore. It looks like someone passed out and tipped face-forward onto their keyboard. It looks like a drunk guy typing in Welsh. Stop that.
So, Giants. First, I saw They Might Be Giants on Saturday night. I wasn’t supposed to see them, I didn’t have a ticket. Cricket was going with his best friend Pabby. However, Pabby’s wife went into labor the night before and Cricket couldn’t find anyone else to go, so I got Pabby’s ticket. Don’t get me wrong, I love They Might Be Giants. I just don’t care for live music very much. It’s loud, people are blocking my view, I have to put on pants to go out, blah blah blah.
(Funny addition: Pabby’s baby was born at 4:00 in the afternoon and my first reaction was, “Good! Now he can go to the concert at 8:00!” Cricket had to explain to me that no, he can’t. I have little to no motherly instinct, so it never occurred to me that he should spend the rest of the day with the woman who just pushed the fruit of his loins out into the world.)
So I went to the concert. It was lovely to see They Might Be Giants again, they were my first concert when I was seventeen. They sang several songs I could sing along to, so that was fun. I forgot how much I liked them. Now I’ve been listening to them nonstop for two days. It’s like reuniting with an old friend.
The next day was the Super Bowl. I went to my friend M’s apartment in Brooklyn to watch the game and eat a festive medley of cuisine including homemade jalepeno poppers (excellent, with beer batter, num num). I decided to root for the New York Giants because I had seen They Might Be Giants in New York City the night before and it seemed like there was a theme going. I don’t really give a crap about football, so that seemed like a good enough reason. We made a valiant attempt to watch the game (“They’re flinging the spheroid! Huzzah!”) but by halftime it became a brutal chore for many of us. Two members of the party left during the first half to go play pool. Yeah, we were a devoted footballin’ crowd. Then M’s girlfriend (who had baked cupcakes with green icing to look like the field and other cupcakes with the team’s logos – delicious and pertinent, both things I like in my dessert items) insisted we watch Spike’s halftime show, which was an egg and ham eating contest. It was horrifying. I had to look away from the screen repeatedly. There was a guy eating the ham (I think he was the winner after snorking down SEVEN POUNDS of ham in however many minutes) who had honey glaze and sweat all over his face. He was jumping up and down while shoveling the ham in, oh, it was bad. I blame Cablevision for this. If we had received Animal Planet we would have been watching the Puppy Bowl, but no, I had to watch bloated freaks inhaling food in a way that is NOT RIGHT. Shortly after that, Cricket and I headed for home in order for me to catch the special episode of House (which was excellent, Mira Sorvino was on it, good stuff). It was a good weekend. And yay for my team with the winning. Whoo hoo.