Stuff from March, 2006
This is the archive of tumbledry happenings that occurred on March, 2006.
Backlit
This is the archive of tumbledry happenings that occurred on March, 2006.
Ok, I need to catch up my Harry Potter franchise consumption. I do like the books, for a variety of reasons. (1) Well written. (2) Fun. (3) Provide a cultural touchstone with essentially every child on earth and 75% of college students and some crotchety old people. (4) I like fantasy novels, always will; they are the trashy romance of my book lists. I’ve been feeling nostalgic lately, and reading those books takes me back to high school summers, when I am 98% sure I did not actually have any cares in the world. Seriously. No cares. Anyhow, I think I am caught up on the books (am I? I may not have read the latest slime green one … and I say that with respect to Mary GrandPre), but I do need to see at least two of the movies.
Just as I am waxing philosophical about the past, one of youth’s role models goes and dies. Nothing tells you you are getting older like people from your generation dying. But I say this with tongue in cheek - I do not really put the “facing aging” thing in front of a life lost. I do not know what exactly Kirby Puckett did in his later life (there were some scandals), nor do I care all that much. I do, however, remember being a little kid, new to sports (unlike many boys my age), suddenly finding a touchstone to talk with people about: “He climbed that plexiglass!” I, of course, refer to the unbelievable (and now classic) footage of Puckett chasing down a fly ball and leaping to a seemingly impossbile height to snatch the dang thing out of the air. Wikipedia (personally, I welcome our new referential overloads):
From a Robert Frost poem called Birches.
Today is the day that prospective students tour the dorms at St. Thomas; so, we have done our best to get the building ready for all the visitors: taking shoes out of the hall, removing trash, cleaning up rooms for tours. The whole idea is for Cretin to put its best foot forward to those who might be living here some time soon.
Ryan notes: “I bet in France, instead of cottage cheese, they call it Château de Fromage.” That means (with apologies to Emily Lauren) approximately “Castle of the Cheese.”
I love this.
If you were given that cosmic rewind button, how far back would you go? Would you really be able to stop after yesterday, or last week? Or would you keep going until you didn’t have thumbs to push the button with?
How many stupid musings can one man fit in an away message?
— Sagert Sheets
Act I.
Scene 1. Saturday. The curtain rises to reveal Alex hunkered down over an organic chemistry book, solution manual, notecards and notes. He sighs and pushes his hair back from his forehead. He needs a haircut. The modification of the Wittig recation makes sense, but he wonders if he’ll be able to keep it straight from the 20 other reaction/reagent combinations he has to keep straight.
Bangkok Gem Scam - What an elaborate way to screw someone over. Can you imagine the stories from the people this has happened to?
Hosted the chemistry lab for the state Science Olympiad tournmanet. This shirt is way too big.
Climate control still life.
Canon Awesome Photo Printer - Ten ink colors in this printer. 10!
Great post with advice for first time Dads - Archived with the hope that tumbledry is still around when I say “holy cow I’m going to have a baby and have no idea what is going on.”
You will never have the camera with you when you want it most. When you have it, you will not have its tripod. When you have both camera and tripod, you’ll be out of batteries. This is something like Murphy’s Law of photography, I think. Stay with me here as we are dropped somewhere in the middle of the tracks on which the train of logical progression rides; we shall then round the arc of the story and things will slowly make sense (note to self: stop mixing metaphors).
Barefoot Dad Busts Teens After Chase - This restores my faith in humanity. And vigilante justice.
This snowstorm is the reason we had school off. Thank you so very much, snow.
The best way out is always through.
— Robert Frost
Big 10 Trickery - Another great college prank: one school starts a romantic fling via AIM with the PG at another school. At the game, the first school starts shouting the made up girl’s name … “Pruitt was in total shock.”
When you think ‘aerogel,’ think unbelievable - The most expensive chemical substance known to man, more than safron, etc. For example: “Silica aerogel holds 15 entries in the Guinness Book of Records for material properties …” and “it is very strong structurally, able to hold over 2000 times its own weight” oh … it’s “90-99.8%” air, so it’s also almost transparent. Unreal.
If A is a success in life, then A equals x plus y plus z. Work is x; y is play; and z is keeping your mouth shut.
— Albert Einstein
A Book about Gatorade? - It’s unbelievable to me that someone can write a book about Gatorade … nevertheless, I find the topic rather interesting. How do you leverage a sweetened beverage into a multibillion dollar industry? The thing is: Gatorade doesn’t seem to include any potassium anymore, which would explain why the sodium in it makes me so thirsty.)
Project Gotham 3 - It’s not some virtual-morality thing, but I don’t like to shoot people as a part of my games. So, that explains why Project Gotham racing, with “some of the most beautiful visuals ever to grace a console game” appeals to me. Dan? XBox 360, then this game? I’ll wait.
I was going to write a post about how I thought the headline “orange juice futures looking promising” from the Wall Street Journal was funny … but the paper has since gone out for recycling; and when I think about it (like many posts), it really was not the greatest idea. That said, there were a couple of other things that made me laugh the past couple of days. If I could only remember one …
Brilliant Way to Preserve Snowflakes - Cold runny superglue and some microscope slides will preserve snowflakes indefinitely. This is so cool. Will try next winter. Remind me.
Also, if you can spend any time napping in a field on a summer day when you are younger — do so. That can be the place you visit in your mind when you’re standing on a crowded subway, stooped with back pain, sweating like your pores are water-piks, while a beggar in stained and drooping sweatpants yells in your ear.
Record label: Found - Sometimes, and quite surprisingly, it’s hard to track down information about things. So, I’ve done it for you. Here’s Feist’s record label!
Dear Iron and Wine,
Vis a vis your cover of The Postal Service’s “Such Great Heights,” I’d like to say that, I get it. When you strip away the (albeit magnificent) electronic(a) going on in the background of the original, your acoustic version cuts closer to the heart … it has fewer things to get in the way as it slices into one’s inner sanctum. And yes, I know you guys licensed the song to Mars, Inc. for an M&M commercial, and you know what? That’s ok. Fine by me. The song is still great, even with the goofy kaleidescopic imagery that goes along with it in the commercial (which, in and of itself is not bad; the constrast between music and video is striking). In fact, that delectable clip on the commercial is what reminded me again of your cover, which I had only given 10 seconds of playing time in the past. The track of which I speak is spinning right now: I think I understand what you were thinking when you sang this, and what Ben Gibbard of the Postal Service was thinking when he, surely in a moment of inspired poetry, penned the words.
More “Making Ring from Coin” Stuff - This one seems easier than the last one I posted.
Dark Blade - The Most Amazing Computer Ever Built - A guy in Italy, who apparently works in a professional CNC shop, makes this ultimate computer case out of metal. All metal. All custom computer designed and machined. It’s almost done. Follow new developments here.
Unbelievable balloon art - Via Make.
Best steaks in New York City - This place has been the best steakhouse for in New York for 22 years straight. Also, I seem to have a propensity for talking about places to eat that I have never been … doesn’t make a lot of sense (see In-N-Out Burger).
A random sampling of away messages (one per line, but not always) of folks on America Online Instant Messenger follows:
sometimes it hurts to be a girl.
so hungry…
one
This is the biggest crab I’ve ever seen. Wow.
HI HO HI HO it is off to work I go!!
shut up
crap.
things missing from england/wales:
- oreos
- mountain dew
- corn dogs
crap
So, yes, apparently the Rolling Stones wrote and recorded commercial music for Rice Krispies - Via DF