December 2005

Animation and Music Videos

I would have posted this earlier, but Sara's uploading files from The Sword That Cuts Things 5 and she sent me a preview link which I just had to click on. I think this is her best one yet, as evidenced by the fact that I laughed so hard I actually hurt myself. GO WATCH IT! NOW!

All done? Good. Now go watch all of her other cool animations.

I'll wait.

...

Ok, now for what I was going to post earlier.

-=-=-

I came across this music video over on imakethings.com. I find it unusual that Bre Pettis would post such a link in his blog, but the song is a catchy J-Pop tune and some of the choreographed scenes are actually quite interesting.

Some questions do come to mind, however...

1. Does Yuki know that her blue dress looks like she has a plastic bag wrapped around her neck?

2. How many of the backup dancers are there because dance is a media for which they must suffer in order to achieve true artistic expression?

3. How many of the backup dancers are internalizing the mantra of "I'm doing this for the paycheck, I'm doing this for the paycheck..." while trying to keep straight faces?

4. What the heck is she singing?

An exploding ... what?

One score and 15 years ago something happened in Florence, Oregon that would change geek culture as we know it.

Onlookers didn't know that at the time they were witnessing an event that would then enter the annals of history, but nevertheless that's exactly what happened.

I am of course talking about the exploding whale, as mentioned in Wikipedia. This was not a hoax, and sadly it wasn't a joke or prank either. This was a real event, and you can check out footage of the original news story (including the actual explosion) on Google Video or on TheExplodingWhale.com.

That's right, someone purchased a domain dedicated to a dead whale raining blubber down on hapless bystanders over a quarter mile away.

Oh, how I love the internet. They need to do a Mythbusters episode on this story.

Hometown Tales

While looking for more video content for my new iPod I came across this nifty website that happens to have a blog, podcast, and videocast (vidcast, video podcast, whatever you want to call it).

The goal of this site is to document legends, urban legends, ghost stories, and tidbits of local history from pretty much everywhere. When they discuss their stories they also go into the factual origins of the tale. By that, I mean that if it's based off of a true story they try to get as close to the truth as a couple guys with a camera can get and if it's just fiction they try to explain why the story was made up.

Overall I'm finding their stories to be entertaining, and I think that's the whole reason they're doing this.

They claim to be rather low budget and to be honest there's some evidence of that (some of the media is hosted on a .Mac account and I think I could duplicate most of their editing tricks except for parts of the opening sequence). That being said, the rest of the production is anything but amateurish.

While the equipment might not be extravagant the writing and videos appear to have been put together by people experienced with working in television. This is, no doubt, because Hometown Tales has in fact appeared on TV in New York, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey.

While those are the states to which they cater they appear to have stories from all over the US, and their podcast covers world news as well.

If you've got broadband you should check out the videos. Otherwise, take a look at the stories and see if there's a cool one near you.

http://www.hometowntales.com/

Some jobs are better than others

Gretchen emailed me this rather amusing Windows Media file and I just broke out laughing. NSFW due to some rather strong language.

What the ... ? #7: Safety Warning Flashing Lamp

Taking a flashing light with you should you happen to go out at night is a good idea, there's no denying it. What's amusing here is how the package was labeled.

BI CYCLE (because we do not discriminate against any kinds of cycles, straight or otherwise)

BABY (honey, make sure you strap a flashing light to Junior before he crawls outside for the night)

DISABLE-CAR (is that a car that is disabled, or a car that disables others?)

WHEN THE BRIGHT IS NOT ENOUGH (well that just goes without saying.)

TO INCREASE MORE SAFETY (more power, er, safety!)

... ah, engrish, how do I love thee...

Still Not Dead

I've been a little derelict on my blogging duties, I know, but I thought I would take some time today to give some updates.

Stomach Problems:

Turns out it's some kind of inflammation, most likely caused by bacteria but I haven't heard back about the biopsy results.

I must say the day they shoved the camera down my throat was quite interesting. The doctor was kind enough to print out some pictures for me, but since he showed me while I was still mostly under the effects of whatever sedation they gave me for the procedure I only remember seeing some pretty colors. Kelli took good care of me that day, as I was zonked out.

As an aftermath, until this whole thing clears up I'm not allowed to eat spicy foods, fatty foods, fried foods, foods with tomato based products, foods with peppermint oil, citrus, caffeine, and I think there's a few things I'm forgetting right now. Essentially almost everything I like I can't have. Boy, I feel old now.

Oh, and I'm also taking a medication called Protonix. Check out the side effects. Apparently a drug I'm taking because I have stomach pain could possibly cause stomach pain. Good times, I say, good times.

Tooth Problems:

The tooth is feeling much better now that a dentist has drilled out all the pulp and capped it with a temporary filling. I'm going in on Tuesday to have something more permanent put in place.

School Problems:

There are none. I love my job. Where else can you get paid to go into a room with thirty 1st graders, watch a movie on dinosaurs, and then play with paint? Mwa-HAHAHAHA!!!

Computer Problems:

Paid too much money to find out I just needed a good defragging. After I got my new iPod video I used it as a back up hard drive and did a total reinstall. The system runs much faster now and I didn't loose anything that I didn't want to be rid of. I think in the long run it was a good thing, since I'm now making a lot of changes I was too lazy to make before.

Kelli's Problems

Health-wise I think she's doing better than me right now! She's looking for a new job and once she gets one we'll be getting a 2nd car again. If Kelli wants me to be more specific she can always blog it herself (hint, hint...)

BESMd20 Problems

I need to update more often. I know. I'm getting to it.

RPG: TGC Problems

34 out of 255 cards now have illustrations. That's a small percentage but 32 of them were completed in the past two weeks. I'm going the M:TG route and not using a common style throughout all of them, but I'd like to try and have as many of them as possible contain original art. Once I've driven my muse mad with ceaseless demands I'll move on to Creative Commons licensed art that specifically allows commercial use. (See, Paul? I'm not a total slacker.)