December 25, 2005
links for 2005-12-26
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How, out of 40 pictures chosen, do two of them end up being pictures of haggard former US pop stars? And unremarkable pictures, no less, of Madonna and Courtney Love.
Posted by starlen at 09:19 PM | Comments (0)
December 23, 2005
The Christmas Gift
Alright, the NES collection on eBay ended at $7200, an amount that failed to make the reserve. It's possible that somebody out there made private arrangements to buy the collection for me, but I have a feeling that the more likely possibility is that you people just don't care enough.
Maybe you bought me the Rush Limbaugh warrior painting I asked for. But let's be clear. That thing's like 20 bucks, tops, so it's not a real present, which is of course expressed in terms of dollar bills.
So I've got just the thing. It'll cost you a little more than the homoerotic Clinton-slaying Rush, but should be less than the NES collection. On the other hand, it might require smuggling, international intrigue, and the violation of numerous health code laws.
This can mean, only one thing, of course:
I want a sloth.
I could write a thousand reasons why I need a sloth, or I could just show you another picture:
They're adorable. I'll build a network of branches from my ceiling for them to hang out in, when they're not interested in sitting on the couch with me and watching tv or playing video games. Like this guy:
Seriously. Take a closer look at this guy - I think he's leering:
I don't drink beer, but somehow, I think this sloth would make me. Like, I'd put a beer in his hand, and then he'd call me a girl for not drinking with him, and then he'd make a cute leery face, and suddenly, I'm knocking one back. This might sound crazy, and yet, I think we both see it there.
Note, though - these are 3-toed sloths. If you get me a 2-toed sloth, things are likely to end up rather bloody, as I hear they can be vicious. Also, they're slightly less cute than their extra-toed counterparts.
I promise to keep my house free from jaguars and harpy eagles, two of the sloth's main predators. I'll let him swim in the apartment pool, since sloths are apparently good swimmers. Also, I see that they eat lizards. Aggie Bob and Roscoe Dudley, our two cats, catch lizards and bring them in the house all the time. Since they never eat them, this is a win-win situation for everybody involved.
Also, if you don't get me this sloth, this little girl may eat him. Seriously, somewhere on the internet, I read that they people eat sloths. I'm too tired to find it, but trust me - I found it on the internet.
Now go get me a sloth.
Posted by starlen at 12:40 AM | Comments (0)
December 22, 2005
links for 2005-12-23
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Apparently, Ebert didn't think there was a single bad film this year, considering his list has about 12,000 movies on it. Oh, and he put Crash at #1.
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Fantastic portfolio of illustrations. Wouldn't mind hanging some of these prints on my walls.
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I'll have to give these a try, now equipped with my Machine Project diy simple-circuit-squarewave-building workshop knowledge.
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Download 50 Foot Wave's new ep for free, and then go buy their other stuff. And while you're at it, buy Hersh's fantastic solo album, Hips and Makers.
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I think I want to buy a giant plot of land in the middle of the forest and put up a bunch of awesome prefab structures.
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Best friends can be difficult. Especially MS Paint friends.
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Not as interesting an article as it could be. But, any negative Scientology news from a large media outlet gets a good vote from me.
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Which is to say, not always rosy. Watch them bicker while filming promos for the show. (In-browser video)
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A 35mm cinema lens adapter for DV cams. Should look into this a bit more.
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The making of the BBC's Station IDs.
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As advertised - vintage photos wherein the photographer's shadow makes an appearance.
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So if I'm reading this right: she builds models based on aerial photos, furnishes them with dollhouse furniture, and then makes paintings of the models. Great!
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Ahem, that's soda pop cans. And lots of 'em.
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Incredibly handy/practical tool. Is this cheating?
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More prefab construction.
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Prefab contsruction.
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Lunchmeat Claus!
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It'd be nice to have a couple of these. Provocative and interesting concepts intelligently illustrated.
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Cuidado: Vomito de Gato sign!
Posted by starlen at 09:20 PM | Comments (0)
December 21, 2005
links for 2005-12-22
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BRING THEM ALL DOWN.
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As expected, I thought, until I got to #1. Then I was excited to see somebody call out Crash for exactly what it is: "smug Afterschool Special nonsense...made up only of manipulation and simplicity." Angrily written, but no less correct for it
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"So, long story short, Don Cheadle is waiting for you out in the parking lot, and he looks really pissed."
Posted by starlen at 09:19 PM | Comments (0)
December 20, 2005
links for 2005-12-21
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Awesome. Accuse people of shoplifting and scam them into paying civil penalties. More money to line Santorum's pockets, and to print up "Voting is for Old People" shirts.
Posted by starlen at 09:20 PM | Comments (0)
December 17, 2005
links for 2005-12-18
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If four critics have had the same critical responses to Terrence Malick's four films, across thirty years, maybe there's a reason for it. I don't hate the guy's films, but I think all these arguments are valid.
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Yes, yes, yes. Via Screenhead.com.
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I want to live in a world where this was a bigger hit, and we all have a "I remember where I was when I heard it" moment. Also, I want an "I'm a Grabowski!" t-shirt.
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It's weird how unreal settings you're used to seeing only in B&W look in color.
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Click here to see this site in the Glitch Browser. Awesome.
Posted by starlen at 09:17 PM | Comments (0)
December 16, 2005
links for 2005-12-17
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The Swap Meet Biennale (the Bronco Swap Meet in El Paso, TX Jan 6th/7th) is a project involving 28 int'l participants, all with an interest in creative and nontraditional modes of cultural production, interrelations, and artistic dictates. (Including me!)
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Look at the last picture. There's a surprise. Sort of NSFW, if your coworkers are looking really closely at what you're looking at.
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Also, if you see me pedal by during my route tomorrow morning, resist the urge to run out of your front door brandishing a butcher knife.
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the yeti explains the necessary evil of spreading my humps: "Now you understand . . . and it's knowledge that can never be unlearned."
Posted by starlen at 09:20 PM | Comments (0)
December 15, 2005
links for 2005-12-16
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Three Things To Do With A Time Machine: 1) Warn Lincoln about going to Ford's Theater. 2) Kill Hitler. 3) Prevent the Black Eyed Peas from recording "My Humps."
Posted by starlen at 09:18 PM | Comments (0)
Movin' on up!
Just spotted on the freeway: A blonde woman with giant hair and lots of make-up/plastic surgery driving a new black Hummer H2 with tinted windows. On the back window was the S-through-two-triangles that is the Scientology logo.
Her license plate:
OT Bound
Posted by starlen at 04:48 PM | Comments (1)
December 14, 2005
People I (don't) Look Like
Separated at birth?
According to myHeritage's Face Recognition Technology, I look like the following people, in descending order of matchiness (that's the scientific term, I think):
- Uri Geller
- Johnny Depp
- Jim Morrison
- Ernest Rutherford
- Saul Bellow
- Anthony Quinn
- Meat Loaf
- Rutherford B Hayes
- Art Garfunkel
You may be saying to yourself: none of those people look anything alike.
When you add me to the list, that thesis still holds true. However, when I'm matched to some of these people on other scales - willingness to do anything for love, but won't do that, spoonbending, being the Garfunkel to another person's Simon, writing crappy overrated pseudo-existential music and then growing bloated in France before ODing in a bathtub, being the 19th president of the United States - we're practically the same people.
Give it a try and let me know if your luck is any better.
Posted by starlen at 09:30 PM | Comments (2)
links for 2005-12-15
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Self-defense night stand/side table turns into a bat and shield!
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With RSS Feeds!
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With RSS feeds!
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Hysterical (in both senses) thread about a certain film: "I will not ever see another movie with either of these men in it, or anything that has Ang Lee's name on it. It took me years to watch a Tom Hanks film after Philadelphia."
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Unfortunate. Also unfortunate: E's choice of a photo of the Daily Show cast laughing juxtaposed with the headline.
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Ambitious!
Posted by starlen at 09:18 PM | Comments (0)
December 13, 2005
links for 2005-12-14
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Are you kidding me with this “There’s a war on Christmas” bullshit? FOX News wasn’t raking in enough cash already from all the Christmas commercials for Kill ‘em All Barbie and Girls Gone Wild Brand Toddler Gear? (via Torrez)
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Apparently not a joke? Awesome.
Posted by starlen at 09:18 PM | Comments (0)
December 12, 2005
links for 2005-12-13
Posted by starlen at 09:18 PM | Comments (0)
NES POWER!
I know you're probably beating yourself up for not buying me that awesome Rush Warrior painting when you had the chance. You held out, thinking you'd come up with just the right gift all on your own, and now that you realize that I wouldn't ask for anything less than a perfect gift, someone probably beat you to it.
So here's your next chance: every single game ever for the NES. That's 781 games, including Friday the 13th! (It doesn't say that one specifically, but, really, if every US-released game is in there, it'd have to be included.)
Now, you may be thinking that I'll probably play about 12 of these games, realize that most of them suck, and then store them in a pile in my closet among all of that other stuff in there that "no, really, I really need." And that I'll pull the power pad out and use my hands to cheat for a single game before I remember that it's not very fun and then start throwing it against the wall in frustration.
But it's got the Power Glove! And the UForce! Remember the UForce? Remember how you didn't have the UForce, but that one asshole kid named Kenny bragged about it at school but wouldn't invite you over to his place, so you never got to play it, but it looked really awesome the way that you played it without touching it, but just by waving your hands over it? Well, this is your chance to help me get back at Kenny. Screw that punk.
Right now, the bidding's at just $6,600, and the reserve hasn't been met. It's your chance to swoop in and win this for me, but the clock is ticking - the auction ends on the 18th. And, please, don't balk at the price tag - that's just gauche. It's the thought that counts, not the money.
Oh, also, it apparently doesn't come with R.O.B. the Robot. so you'll need to pick that up for me separately.
Previous gift ideas: The Rush Warrior Painting.
Posted by starlen at 01:37 AM | Comments (1)
December 10, 2005
links for 2005-12-11
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My hero.
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You like zombies? You like speed metal? You like fat guys with shotguns? Then I've got a game for you.
Posted by starlen at 09:18 PM | Comments (0)
Ol' Glory
Oddly enough, neither freedom nor liberty are listed as ingredients.
Posted by starlen at 12:18 AM | Comments (0)
December 09, 2005
Holiday Misadventures, Part I : The Turkey
Myself and the little lady ventured out to Colorado for an extended Thanksgiving break this year, at the invitation of our good friends Tomas and Karen. The invitation was for a Fourth of July celebration, but, as ever, I can't help but be fashionably late. And my parents had already decided to have an early Thanksgiving so that they might head off to visit the great Northwest, so Siana and I had an extended weekend sans family obligations to kill anyhow.
More importantly, though, Tomas had uttered the magic words: deep-fry. As in, "We're gonna deep-fry the turkey this year."
I was in.
I could tell you all about how wonderful the trip was, on the idyllic ranch spread he has out there (a frozen lake! bounding deer outside our window! the charming, if slightly horrifying barn attached to the house we slept in! stars that actually twinkle in the night sky, and thousands of them, uninterrupted by the crazy light pollution of los angeles!), but I'll try and cut to the chase: the turkey-frying was a near-complete disaster.
I got my first notion that something might be wrong when I heard Tomas arguing with his mother about whether or not she actually agreed to pick up a second turkey, an errand which she did not run. She seemed to think Tomas was crazy - and I started to realize that when Tomas said "We're gonna deep-fry a turkey," he meant just us, as in him and I, and not as in him and his family. They, in fact, would already be eating their oven-baked turkey while Tomas and I sat shivering in the windy 30 degree weather watching over a roiling pot of five gallons of oil.
The night before Turkey day, we stopped by an Ace hardware store, where the employee cobbled together parts from two separate returned fryers to create a complete single fryer set for us, as they were otherwise sold out. If any employee offers to do this for you, politely decline. I say this as a seasoned veteran now - one who realizes that in deepfrying turkey, there's already enough that can go wrong without taking your chances on some "Well, it looks like it fits okay" nonsense.
The manufacturer of the fryer (Bayou Classic) sells a 3 gallon tank of peanut oil for frying. This was conveniently placed next to where the stack of fryers once sat, so that you presumably can purchase all of your frying needs at once. The more observant readers will also notice that 3 gallons is about two shy of the five I mentioned earlier. Thank you, Bayou Classic.
The Bayou Classic Meat Marinade Injector
The morning of Thanksgiving, we got a late start. Late enough that it was less morning - more afternoon, really - and the rest of the family had already had their turkey cooking for a couple of hours. But, hey, this was frying - the box says 3 minutes per pound, so we were looking at a 45 minute cooking time. That gave us about 30 minutes to set up, so we were good.
We thought. First, we took about 30 minutes just setting up the rig. It's not rocket science, but we were easily distracted, and then there was that whole "we wanna make sure we don't blow the house up" thing. And then, when we measured the level of oil we'd need (by putting the turkey in the fryer and filling it up with water until it fully immersed the turkey), we found that we were short by a little over a gallon and a half. Oops.
The Set-Up.
Did I mention Tomas and his family live up a windy road in the hills? About 30 minutes one way from any sort of store? No? Well, they do. And as such, there was no way we could get more oil and cook without eating an hour or so after everyone else.
We frantically ransacked the houses - there are five residences on their spread - grabbing everything: sunflower oil, olive oil, vegetable oil. We dumped a couple of $10 and $15 bottles of olive oil just to get another half inch towards the three or so missing. By the time we were done, we were still almost an inch short, and there was no oil of any sort left anywhere on that property.
That's a lot of oil.
And then we turned up the heat. Heating a five gallon tub of oil to 350 degrees in the cold also takes a little bit longer than expected. So, we waited. And then we broke out the broomstick.
90 to 120 seconds to lower the turkey, the manual said. Some people use chain winches and pulleys for this shit (an uncle of Tomas', for example, had seen this done before using just such a mechanism in someone's garage. He became our resident expert, an unspoken title we'd later regret conferring upon him). Tomas and I took opposite ends of the broomstick and began rehearsing our lowering technique.
You may have heard stories of houses burning down, from turkey-fry attempts gone horribly awry. Let me say: doing this is probably incredibly easy (burning a house down, I mean).
As we held the turkey over the fryer, it began to pop and sizzle like mad as a few drops of turkey juice spilled over into the vat. This was disconcerting, but not nearly as much as when the oil boiled over, hitting the flame, and causing a small fire to creep up the side of the vat. Our response was for me to mumble "Uh, there's a fire" and Tomas to respond with "Where?," and then, well, nothing, as it didn't seem to be getting much higher. But it did start dripping flames down on the rocks, which was kind of cool looking, if not particularly safe.
Lowering the turkey. Slowly.
So, we drop the turkey in. And then we watch, worried, as the thermometer drops to about 200 degrees. It's still boiling, so we can't see in to eyeball the turkey's cooking progress. We figure maybe the turkey cooled the oil down real quick, and we just needed to wait.
Ten minutes later, we're still waiting for the temperature to go back up. So we start cranking the heat. Five minutes, no change. I suggest that maybe the thermometer is somehow stuck in the turkey and giving us a false reading. Sure, it's a straw, but I'm still gonna grasp at it. So we pull it up a bit. We notice, now that enough oil has boiled out/burnt off/been absorbed by the turkey, that the tiny bit of leg sticking out appears to be almost black. We bring out our resident expert who assures us, "No, that looks right. Some of that stuff flakes right off. It's delicious."
That thermometer is not moving.
Five minutes or so later, some one notices that the temperature now reads 50 degrees. Full bore panic mode, Tomas cranks the propane all the way up. We're giving it all we've got, and it's still not moving. We're worried.
Five more minutes - we're up to about twenty-five minutes now - and the gauge still hasn't moved. And there's no way, I realize, that the temperature could be 50 degrees for boiling oil. Frustrated, I grab the thermometer, and then I note with horror:
The needle is not moving, even as the dial spins.
I crank it to the right, and suddenly it's reading subzero temperatures. I crank it to the left, and we're in the 600 degree red range. I alert Tomas of our suddenly terminal condition - "We've been in the red the whole time!", and we all laugh hysterically at the demonstration of the screwed thermometer. Tomas cranks the heat down, knocks five minutes off of the timer, and then heads in the house for some of the Thanksgiving dinner the rest of the family has been eating for the last twenty minutes or so.
After a moment of introspection - and another look at the black turkey leg - it occurs to me that we should probably pull the thing out. I run back in and grab Tomas, who seems remarkably nonplussed. I, on the other hand, am gravely concerned.
We lift the thing out, and it is a golden . . . black. Yeah, pretty much black. And a good third of it appeared to evaporate entirely - there was webbing where once there was skin and meat.
This turkey is cooked.
Our Judas wives are quick to alert the family of the disastrous consequences of our venture. They all stream out of the house and have their laughs as Tomas and I hold each other, sobbing, robbed of our delicious deep-fried goodness. I grab the turkey leg and barely push down, snapping it in half in the process. Pictures are taken. Trying to be good sports, I pop a bit of skin in my mouth, and am overcome by the taste of pure char, as Tomas immediately spits out his bite. The family laughs some more. We cry some more.
About to be spit out.
And then the family returns to their holiday, and it's just the two of us again, cleaning up, sadly gathering our tools and worthless turkey. Momentarily and simultaneously, we pause, quietly reflecting on the experience.
And then, swear to god, the egg timer went off.
Epilogue: About an hour and a half later, someone carved deep into one of the breasts to salvage about a handful of meat. And it was, no exaggeration, the best turkey I've ever tasted. I'm not sure if that's a happy ending, or an even sadder one, as we got only a tantalizing single bite from the fruits of our labor.
Posted by starlen at 01:00 AM | Comments (1)
December 08, 2005
links for 2005-12-09
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"The BEPs current single, "My Humps," is one of the most popular hit singles in history. It is also proof that a song can be so bad as to veer toward evil." The WORST. When I hear "lovely lady lumps" in reference to an ass, I can only think of tumors.
Update: Drew of Script-o-Rama has alerted me to the alarming fact that Fergie of the Peas is now acting. God help us, and save us from her becoming a hyphenated performer.
Posted by starlen at 09:18 PM | Comments (1)
My iTunes Signature
This is one of the coolest things I've seen in a while: the iTunes Signature Maker. I'll let Jason Freeman describe it, since he made it:
People often ask me what music I listen to, and I find it difficult to describe my enormous music collection in just a few sentences. So I created iTSM to answer in sound a question I cannot answer in words.
iTSM selects a small number of your "favorite" tracks based on some simple selection criteria, such as the number of times you have played them or the rating you have assigned them. Then it analyzes the audio content of these files, combining a small bit of each of them to create the signature.
Maybe you'll load your iTunes signature onto your iPod, e-mail it to some friends, share it in our signature gallery, or stick it on your home page. Maybe it will help you gauge your compatibility with your next blind date: "She seems nice enough, but her iTunes signature is just so atonal! Should I go with my heart or with my ear?" Or maybe an iTunes signature will figure prominently into a political attack ad: "If you're mad at him for raising your taxes, polluting our environment, and cutting the education budget, just wait until you hear the music he listens to…"
You can select the criteria for song selection (most played/recently added/top rated), and select the number of songs, how many seconds it should snip (between 1 and 6, I think), and how many songs it can layer at once (from 1 to 10). It even generates a report telling you which songs it used, in which order, and what snippets of the song it took for your signature.
So, without further ado, I present to you my iTunes signature (1.32mb mp3). Three seconds of each of the 50 most listened to songs on my iTunes (restricted to one song per album, so that it didn't turn into a Richard Buckner/Interpol/Spoons: Ohia fest) mixed and layered into a single meta-song, clocking in at just under a minute and a half.
Let me know if you recognize anything, for better or worse. And let's hear yours!
Posted by starlen at 02:55 AM | Comments (1)
December 07, 2005
links for 2005-12-08
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papercraft sloths ... awesome! from yamaha? ... strange.
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Awesome! Generates a metasong of your top rated or most played songs. Super great. Try it now before the RIAA decides it needs to be shut down.
Posted by starlen at 09:19 PM | Comments (0)
December 06, 2005
links for 2005-12-07
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Smart observations about file-sharing from someone in a unique position to speak from (musician in a known but not profitable band, generally against pirating but sees that file-sharing helps and DRM hurts.)
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Recent notes on capital-D Delusion: Jonathan Rhys-Davies says of Uwe Boll: "He reminds me of another Hollywood rebel in his own way. I mean George Lucas." (I don't even like Lucas and I know this is crazy.)
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Ha!
Posted by starlen at 09:19 PM | Comments (0)
December 05, 2005
links for 2005-12-06
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When cops called to say security guards found her son wandering around the first floor of the mall at 2:17 a.m. yesterday, she replied: "I'm not coming all the way back there just to pick him up."
Posted by starlen at 09:18 PM | Comments (0)
December 04, 2005
links for 2005-12-05
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cute cg animation of vampire sibling rivalry.
Posted by starlen at 09:18 PM | Comments (0)
December 02, 2005
links for 2005-12-03
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Steve Martin dated Cindy Sherman? Weird. (see also: this page)
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Good news - The Devil's Backbone is great, and Hellboy was pretty good considering the budget. Del Toro directing a film w/Peter Jackson providing a budget and running interference could be fantastic.
Posted by starlen at 09:18 PM | Comments (1)
Rush Warrior!
It's December, and that means a couple of things:
- I need to hurry up and post the inanities of my Thanksgiving festivities (it involves evaporated turkey meat, carbonated brussels sprout, and my vomit, among other things) before it's completely beside the point, and
- It's getting close to that magic day, when people should be buying me all sorts of gifts (this is probably Christmas, but feel free to buy me presents in honor of Hanukkah or Kwanzaa).
So, in order to make your task easier, I'm going to highlight a few things I want this month, starting with this gem:
It's a portrait of one of my favorite intellectual giants, Rush Limbaugh, "as he protects 'Lady Liberty' and 'Miss Justice' from the lecherous tentacles of the forked-tongued Bill and his cronies." (Which appears to be Hillary . . . and who?) And it's a steal at only $20! Autographed! Click to be whisked away to the site of fantasy illustrator Clyde Caldwell, where you can spy the full majesty of the painting. And then get on top of this now, people, because my gift requests are only going to get more expensive.
I'm assuming his new muscle-y awesomeness is owed at least in part to the physique-enhancing effects of inhaling Oxy-Contin at the rate a horse eats through hay.
Posted by starlen at 01:16 AM | Comments (0)
