Month: December 2005 Page 1 of 2

John Scalzi (aolscalzi) links to a story revealing Roto-rooters list of strange things they have pulled out of plumbing, including an Civil War cannon shell, a collection of miniature liquor bottles, and a live cat.

Oh wow, I would LOVE to go and see the World Pyro Olympics:

The World Pyro Olympics is an annual international competition amongst the most prestigious fireworks companies in the world. Nine international participants will showcase the best of classical pyrotechnic displays. On the final eve of the event, the sky will be illuminated by The World Pyro Olympics Fellowship of Fire Pyrotechnic Display -a joint fireworks display from the nine countries and the organizer, La Mancha Pyro Productions.

Five days of fireworks. Wow. Cool. (Too bad it just ended…)

Reuters reports that a pound of rare Indonesian coffee, unique for having passed through the digestive tract of a nocturnal tree-dwelling mammal called a palm civet, costs $175, making it the most expensive coffee in the world and proof that no matter how silly you think people can be, they are actually capable of being even sillier.

MedPage Today reports that Harry Potter is not only a literary sensation, but he may be helping keep muggle kids safe.

That’s the opinion of researchers here, who found that when the latest installments of the Harry Potter books came out, the number of kids showing up in the emergency room with broken bones, sprains, scrapes and bruises went down significantly.

Apparently, kids were just so wild about Harry that they didn’t have time to ride a skateboard down a flight of stairs, or weave a scooter through heavy traffic.

Finally, proving that all you *do* need is love, British millionaire Sharon Tendler married her sweetheart of 15 years, a 35 year old Dolphin named Cindy, in a touching and likely quite damp ceremony in the Israeli resort of Eilat on Thursday.

“I’m the happiest girl on earth,” the bride said as she chocked back tears of emotion. “I made a dream come true, and I am not a pervert,” she stressed.

Best wishes and long life to the happy….couple.

Wired News has a report on Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales’s practice of editing his own bio article, a violation of Wiki ettiquette. This lead the folks on Slashdot to indulge in the form of pointless wankery that passes for sport on Slashdot. I’m not sure why I find it so amusing, but I do.

Speaking of Slashdot, they have a fun Q&A session with Adam Savage and Jaimie Hyneman, the presenters of Discovery’s wonderful TV show MythBusters

Just in time for the holidays, It’s A Wonderful Life in 30 seconds and re-enacted by bunnies. Requires Flash. And a somewhat robust sense of amusement.

Chicago Magazine has a long and fascinating feature article on Sun-Times film critic Roger Ebert. I love reading Ebert’s reviews, not because I always agree with him, but because his obvious passion for the art of movies permeates every word he writes about them. I just finished reading his book, “I Hated Hated Hated This Movie”, a collection of negative reviews from throughout his long career. Go read it, it’s interesting stuff.

Phil Dunlap’s wonderfully funny new comic strip, Ink Pen, ran into a bit of a problem: it turns out, one of it’s signature characters, Captain Victory, shared a name with a character created by the late, great Jack Kirby. Unfortunately, the trademark on the name still belongs to the Kirby estate. Rather than get bogged down in unpleasantness, Dunlap worked the problem into the strip. (Link to first strip in series, which continues through the week.)

Ressurecting my old “Daily Digest” of random stuff that I’ve seen elsewhere on Livejournal or the Internet at Large. Some of it will be informative, some of it humourous, and none of it really worth making an entire post over. Enjoy!

Physorg.com has an article detailing The Most Offbeat Science News of 2005, including researchers in California building DNA profiles from leftovers of a dinner party, the discovery of the stone dwelling puzzle mouse, and the revelation that cane toads are attracted to disco lights.

Queer Eye for the Straight Guy food maven Ted Allen spoke with NPR’s Susan Stanberg with turkey tips and other holiday recipes. (The audio link on the page linked requires javascript and RealAudio or Windows Media Player).

Also on NPR, a rememberance of John Langstaff, founder of the Christmas Revels, who passed away last week. I meant to send this to telynor when I heard it on the radio, and figure that it fits nicely here as well.

the_magician and filkertom point to the Music Genome Project. Quoth the Magician:

A group of musicians have listened to tens of thousands of tracks by thousands of artists and figured out a “genetic fingerprint” for each … and then they’ve set up an internet streaming radio station where you can type in an artist you like (e.g. Sarah McLachlan) and they look at the fingerprint (Subtle use of vocal harmony, mild rhythmic syncopation, acoustic rhythm piano, meandering melodic phrasing and mixed acoustic and electric instrumentation.) and play other tracks that they think you will enjoy. You can vote “like”/”dislike” for each track and it will build up a better targetted radio stream for you.

Requires Flash.

kightp links to a delightfully tongue-in-cheek article on the Catholic Church’s decision to close Limbo.

You can buy a tank from Amazon. (Side note to folkmew: Where *else* would you look to buy a tank?)

beige_alert points us towards The Cavalcade of Bad Nativites. Some of this stuff is just pure freakin’ art, man.