That's How It Happened

It's nice to be ahead of the curve. Last year I fell off my brother's fixed gear bike, and gave it up. Then Hiroshi Fujiwara got into it, and now there's a feature in the NYT about it.

An unassisted triple play happened on Sunday, for only the 13th time ever in Major League Baseball.

Great wikipedia article about pneumatic tubes aka Lamson tubes, and how they failed to live up to their futuristic promise. (via Deeplinking).

Whipped yogurt crisp recipe, from Ideas In Food, who are the Heston and Ferran of food bloggers.

Yetisports remixed into a gorefest: Bloody Penguin Throw. (Here's the original, in case the joke is lost on you.)

I've never seen this before, but here's another example of movies recut to fit a tribute song: Die Hard by Guyz Nite. It's a pretty loving tribute too. via Solace)

Weng Weng where have you been all my life? How can I not have known about a pair of late 70's/ early 80's James Bond spoofs, starring a midget, dubbed from Tagalog into English, packed to the gills with kung fu, topless girls, and low budget stunts. This trailer, with synchronised rap soundtrack, makes me feel high, and not entirely in a good way.

Labels: wengweng

Rowley Leigh had an interesting opinion piece in the Standard on Friday (sadly not online), about UK success in the Top 50 restaurants list. He hypothesises that the fancy expensive cooking going on, mostly in and around London, is merely a function of big city bonuses:

"It is all tremendously exciting but one cannot help thinking that this "renaissance" is a flimsy edifice, built precariously on the shifting sands of a boom economy."

He suggests that other less lauded restaurants, outside the World Top 50 are struggling to survive amid a culture of expensive refits, and rising costs. It is hardly a secret that many new restaurants fail to prosper, or that young chefs are over-worked. What Leigh ignores is that the UK restaurants outside the Top 50 list that most consistently garner critical and popular acclaim are those that already focus on serving brilliantly executed, but affordable food. Restaurants like Bacchus, Arbutus, and Acorn House have utterly different philosophies, but all provide Londoners with an opportunity to eat really well without breaking the bank. Even beyond these headline-grabbing openings are legions of established local restaurants, unencumbered by the high rents of the West End, serving authentic "cheap eats" to packed tables. Undoubtedly some restaurants will close if recession comes, but hopefully it will be those serving overpriced mediocre food, rather than the ones we actually like.

LOL-Kitteh; great post trying to track the origins of this strange language that teh cats use to communicate on teh internets.

Ceauşima, a portmanteau of Ceauşescu and Hiroshima, describing the areas of Bucharest devastated by Ceauşescu's architectural policies.

Zeptogram, appearing in an article about the weight of a single cell.

Accismus, a classic word for the irony of expressing disinterest in something you are offered and actually desire.

Heeb-Hop, a term for jewish rappers like MC Rebbe and 50 Shekel.

Labels: wotd

MTAS is down for "routine maintenance", after what some people have suggested is the most significant security lapse in government held data ever.

Labels: lolcat, MTAS

V NSFW Lazy Sunday by some Cambridge teens. (via)

"I often complain to interviewers that 'weblog' is the least interesting of my many neologisms."

Jorn's tour of 32 years of his own neologisms is fascinating reading. At my Dream Dinner Party, Jorn would get to sit at the head of the table every time.

And via Jorn, an article suggesting that human hairlessness evolved for marathon like hunting on the hot African plains. All the more interesting in light of London's hottest ever marathon.

Honey comb vase made by bees in the hive. It's a bit of a fudge, beacuse the bees have been given shaped wax foundation to draw out, but it's still beautiful.

Lifesize Google Maps red "map pin", via jwz, who has some good related links.

I have it on good authority that Stuart Butterfield's favourite flickr tag is insectporn.

DJ Charlie Beez AKA Counter Reset AKA the drummer from gwEm has released possibly the worst song of all time. Hopefully there's no such thing as bad publicity?

I've taken a downturn in my never-ending quest to eat at all of the World's Top 50 Restaurants. This year's list, out today, has lost Gramercy Tavern and La Colombe, two that I had actually eaten at. I'm currently on a score of seven, and even that's a bit of a stretch: Fat Duck, Nobu, Hakkasan, Atelier Joel Robuchon, Quartier Francais, St John, and Noma.

Naomi Wolf really adds some substance to the constant Bush=Hitler comparisons with this guide to 10 ways in which republican policies have stifled US freedoms and democracy. The most depressing part is her suggestion that Hilary will merely maintain these "reforms" once elected.

This is the best Rube Goldberg machine ever. I am suspicious that is was filmed in separate segments, but it's still ingenious in wonderful ways.

Lucafilm approved this 86 foot high, 640lb Darth Vader shaped helium balloon.

A polite letter from the Smithsonian.

"We have given this specimen a careful and detailed examination, and regret to inform you that we disagree with your theory that it represents "conclusive proof of the presence of Early Man in Charleston County two million years ago." Rather, it appears that what you have found is the head of a Barbie doll, of the variety one of our staff, who has small children, believes to be the "Malibu Barbie"."

There's a comedy genius lurking in the antiquities department. It reads like a letter to McSweeney's or a feature at the Onion.

Speaking of which the new Onion Infographic on Chinese Piracy deliciously blurs the distinction between parody and truth.

Suicide Food, a niche blog about pictures of animals inviting you to eat them. They should check out both the Au Pied de Cochon and Pork & Sons cookbooks which are liberally illustrated with cartoons of happy doomed pigs demonstrating their tender cuts. Is it just me or did the vegetarians lose?

Lego Star Wars models employing the least pieces possible.

Oh, and I'm on Facebook now. You'll find me on the first page of Rufuses, so go ahead and add me.

If animal Top Trumps had "cute" as a category otters would win every time.
Evidence A: Video of otters holding hands.
Evidence B: Video of baby otter learning how to swim.
Evidence C: Video of otter recycling rubbish.

Labels: otters

Happy Monkey Valley is a new feature in Everland, South Korea's largest theme park. Seemingly the world's happiest orang also got to climb the promotional banana tower. I'm not sure how far this monkey goodness will go towards correcting the Korean PR disaster that is the Old Boy/Seung-hui Cho connection.

Labels: monkey

Two fantastic articles about great whites off the coast of Cape Town.

Labels: capetown, shark

I've had unexplained ftp problems over the last week, hence the lack of updates. Mysteriously things have resolved themselves. In the absence of posts I've been playing a lot of Nanaca Crash and Zookeeeper, both have which hae been gently tweaked since I last played them. Scores to beat: 6166m and 123k, respectively.

Nike's new AF1 retrospective is jaw dropping. They've gathered 929 different AF1s from collectors around the world. Just stunning.

Labels: af1, nike

Teen party wreaks £20,000 havoc at family home.

"Bring more drink - were gunna run out quick && you will be shitd then. BRING DRINK!!!!! u cant be that skint but if u are, just buy £3.70 day pass && bus it. Sorted! Party party"

I'm not sure if the criminal damage, or the lack of literacy is more deplorable.

Neologism of the day: "cremains", a portmanteau of cremation and remains. Carbon Copies is a project that seeks to make 240 pencils from such cremains; as a creminder presumably. (via things)

A life-size model car. It's supposed to be a 25:1 replica of a 1:25 model, though they slightly cheated by using some real car parts.

Long article in yesterday's Guardian about Chet and Joe. They've been a fixture of Islington life for 25 years, permanently pounding the streets as modern day professional idlers and ranconteurs. I have slightly mixed feelings about seeing them mythologised in ths way.

300 lobsters liberated from Harbour Fish Market in Maine. Most impressed that PETA already have a policy on this: "We never encourage people to give money to the lobster industry, even if it's for the laudable goal of releasing them."

The Pokemon Test of whether wikipedia articles that are essentially fancruft are minor enough to be deleted: "Is the subject more notable than the average Pokémon?"

Invader is the Banksy it's still OK to like.

Labels: grafitti, invader

I've been sick for a whole week now. Miserably sick. I am back at work, but blogging comes a poor second to clutching my head and coughing my lungs out.

Fast forward through the first segment to 23.15. If you like DFW at all, this is 23 minutes of your life well spent.

Labels: dfw

Chimpanzee experts, including Jane Goodall are arguing, that Hiasl, a 26 year old chimp, should be granted asylum seeker status in Austria, and then be allowed to sue the vivisectionists who "illegally abducted" him from Sierra Leone.

"In a test case in Austria, campaigners are seeking to ditch the 'species barrier' and have taken Hiasl's case to court. If Hiasl is granted human status - and the rights that go with it - it will signal a victory for other primate species and unleash a wave of similar cases."

It is April 1st, and this doesn't seem to have been reported anywhere except the Observer but I still think it's fo' rizzle. There's no update about it at the Great Ape Project, but I like the look of their book, The Great Ape Project Census, that documents the living conditions of thousands of great apes across the US.

Labels: chimp