One of those reality-meets-the-Twilight-Zone articles. I think I’m with Radivoje - “The chance of being hit by a meteorite is so small that getting hit six times has to be deliberate.” I’m stumped, if he’s got independent university experts confirming they are in fact meteorites, the plot is pretty thick on this one…

This article is a bit late, I guess the show has already opened by now. But I can’t see how parading Galileo’s remains can be seen as anything but a despicable show of disrespect.

“The laymen and masons that were attending the ceremony thought that
they should have some souvenir of Galileo’s body,” Paolo Galluzzi,
director of Florence’s Galileo Museum, told Reuters in an interview.

“They thought that having a piece of the man would have been a homage to
his tradition. The idea of having relics of science is very similar, is
a mirror of the relics of religion,” he said.

What a tremendous shame. One of the greatest minds that ever lived has a portion of his body on display, ogled by crowds as a carnival freakshow. While we are at it, I offer the following video to the organizers of this show as an equally classy show of behavior: chimpanzee facefucks a frog.

Part of me wants to write, the rest of me just wants to unplug from this shitpile of a world. Why am I so down? Because the 2010 BP Gulf of Mexico Oil Catastrophe (R) is simply the latest amazingly depressing news story that only breaks through my toughened bad news hide because of the scale. If the government is estimating x, the reality is 5-10x, if not more, in terms of the volume of oil in the water. We’ll never know of the damage, really, to the oceans. If reefs start dying that much faster, what will be the reaction? ONE. GIANT. COLLECTIVE. YAWN.

Biodiversity, it seems, is overrated. So is human existence, in my opinion. What a waste. Other than being a hedonist, is there any real way to get through your week without burying your head in either the blessed calm of ignorance or the burning repulsion of unending shame? Really, how do people do it? I’m beginning to understand, if not admire, addicts of all stripes. Find a place to shelve your sorrows and push everything else out of the way to get there.

I’m sorry, I don’t mean to be such a downer. But I’m just tired of all the shitty news, endless stories of powerful pricks who are fucking with the odds of the survival of human civilization, to the extent we ever really were civilized. To the extent that there are many, many, amazing people out there doing incredible things, I want them to win. I want the people on the side of love, of peace, of humor, of free will, of knowledge, of openness, of allowance, of progress to fucking win this seemingly endless shitfest power struggle that is reality at this juncture. Let it be known.

This is a case where you couldn’t write this shit. Who is kicking themselves now more than the Onion? Well, maybe the SEC, but what do you expect? wow.

As Sarah Palin. And yes, she probably WILL run for president, I think she feels she can handle it, as she derides Obama for being a community organizer at one time, and therefore feels her mayoral experience and governorship of Alaska constitute the necessary experience for being president of the USA.

The sad part is, the YEARS of hyper intense study that he had to undergo at the prodding of an intractable mother, which culminated in scholarships to Harvard and a professorship in constitutional law at the University of Chicago (as chronicled in his first book, one I cannot recommend highly enough: “Dreams of my Father”), passes unnoticed in Sarah Palin-land.

He is eloquent because he has read more words in his life than about 1/3 of the GOP *combined*. If that is something of an exaggeration, it is not too far off the mark. Worse, not only can few in the GOP dispute that claim publicly (or risk being part of the “liberal education establishment”), they see it as an asset - their ignorance shtick (to the extent that it is a show) approximates them to their constituents, á la “rancher” Bush.

Maybe all of the above is why I get such a kick out of Tina Fey doing Sarah Palin. Awesome.

While it doesn’t yet have its own entry in Wikipedia as of this writing, Teabonics is the name referring to the creative spelling on protest signs held by outraged right wing political activists, commonly known as the Teabag Party, or, in an incredible lack of foresight and/or cultural awareness, “Teabaggers.” I stumbled on the word, and then did a flickr search. (keep an eye out for “youth in asia will kill your grandma”, which I pray is a troll.) Behold:

If it doesn’t load, here’s a link  (You can accelerate or slow down the image pace under “options”, in the upper right hand corner).

*edit: I didn’t realize that someone has done this superbly at www.teabonics.com. no ads, just 100% juice. nice.

“Pelada” is a portuguese word which means two things: ‘naked’, literally, as in ‘a mulher do vizinho está pelada.’ (The neighbor’s wife is naked ). Idiomatically, it means a pick-up game of soccer, with the interpretation being that it is played barefoot, or at least informally. The filmmakers picked up on the more subtle sense of the word in terms of the naked game of soccer - raw, uncovered, in pure form. The trailer looks very appetizing, I will not miss it.

NEW Pelada Trailer from Rebekah Fergusson on Vimeo.

Two of my favorite public personalities. They should tape together more often, perfect yin-yang. She’s got the earnestness, he’s got the zingers: “The whole country just sucks. Everybody’s getting screwed.”

(yes, I cannot spell “Bill Maher”. This is why comments are disabled on this blog.)

One of the best animations I ever did see.

being teh master genius that I am, I can’t get the friggin’ player thingie to work, so you’re gonna have to go to the awesome black hole time sucker that is TED’s website. But it’s worth it, promise. Shoo.