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Sunday, December 27th, 2009
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johnforster
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I've been thinking really hard about a little though experiment.
Here's the scenario: You find yourself somewhere in the Milky Way galaxy. Nevermind how you got yourself there, you just are. Some friendly aliens have picked you up and are willing to take you back home... but they do not speak English, nor any aural language. They have provided you with a 3D holographic map of the Galaxy that you can fly through virtually, as well as a catalog of almost all 400 billion stars and celestial objects (but not so much planets. That's why they're tooling around the galaxy.) It has an intuitive interface but you are severely limited by the language barrier. You can't filter out, say, Red Giants unless you are really good at playing charades with a species that has no concept of human body language.
The question is: how do you find Earth? What would you know off the top of your head that would serve as easily understandable points of reference? What is the most important thing to remember in order to find the Sun?
I think I could do it. The first thing I'd find is the Magellanic clouds- two dwarf galaxies that orbit the Milky Way. This would tell me which side of the galaxy to focus on. I know we're not near the very center or the very edge. So those deductions narrow me down to a 20,000 lightyear swath.
Here's where it gets tricky. My best bet of finding Earth and getting the aliens to understand what I'm talking about is to find pulsars. But I only know of one (the crab nebula) and I don't know how far away it is off the top of my head. But I do know it is very young, and will still have a nebula around it.
The only other thing that comes to mind is constellations. However, constellations tend to be completely unrecognizable once you get a few light years away from the Earth... except for the Big Dipper. Those stars really are in that formation. So are the Pleiades. It might be a long shot, but if you could find the Big Dipper, and travel around until you see the stars that make up Orion converge. If that worked it'd get you right to the front door of the Solar system.
Assuming that didn't work, nebulae would be my fallback. The Horse Head Nebula in Orion is very distinctive. So you could just check out all nebulae in that 20,000ly swath, find Orion, and find Sol.
Kinda wish I could test this out. Google Earth can only see from the Earth's perspective.
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Comments: Add Your Own.
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Saturday, December 26th, 2009
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gwalla
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What I got this Christmas:
Books:- The Metamorphoses of Tintin, or Tintin for Adults by Jean-Marie Apostolidès
- Cocktail Boothby's American Bar-Tender by William T. "Cocktail" Boothby ("Endorsed by all Clubmen and Mixologists")
CDs- The Ventures - Walk Don't Run: The Best of The Ventures
- Devin Townsend - Ziltoid the Omniscient
- Vijay Iyer Trio - Historicity
and a Slinky.
Also, new suits in preparation for an upcoming job interview. Not shown because I'll be picking them up on Tuesday.
I got my dad several jazz CDs: The Man Who Cried Fire by Rahsaan Roland Kirk, Guitar by McCoy Tyner (featuring Bela Fleck, Bill Frisell, Marc Ribot, John Scofield, and Derek Trucks), and a box set of Sonny Stitt (with booklet by Harvey Pekar). For my mom it was books: the Oxford Book of English Verse, Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke, and Ursula Vernon's Irrational Fears.
Dinner was our traditional Christmas spread: roast beef, Yorkshire pudding, stuffed mushrooms, and creamed spinach garnished with hard-boiled egg yolks and toast stars. This year mom supplemented the usual menu with homemade dinner rolls. Dessert was a trifle made with custard, pound cake, sherry, sour cherry jam, and Cherry Heering.
I hope you all had a merry Christmas!
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Comments: Read 1 or Add Your Own.
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Friday, December 25th, 2009
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monstro_draw
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Hey, merry Christmas from Vancouver!
This is a bit disingenuous, it's been unseasonably dry and mild in Vancouver this last week, but I'm sure it will be dark and wet again in no time.
Has everyone seen A Year Without Santa Claus? I think that it maybe didn't make it on TV up in Canada when I was a kid, I didn't see it until a few years ago,
So I've opted out of Christmas this year (I'm having kind of A Year Without Santa Claus myself, hur hur) and it is a real relief. I'm staying in Vancouver by myself and I'm away from my family for the first year ever. On Christmas Eve I made myself a lil' chicken and went alone to a bar. On Christmas morning I'm eating eggs with back bacon and playing videogames.
Hope things are going nice for you guys this holiday season!
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Comments: Read 33 or Add Your Own.
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sexualcabinetry
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I've long thought that the tale of Bran the Blessed would make for a fantastic Mary Blair style Lil' Golden Book, that starts out adorable and then starts going south with the zombified Irish soldiers and disembodied head cult.
Maybe I'll do it as a three-parter with the Children's Crusade and Why Santa Claus Eats His Babies.
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sexualcabinetry
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"The "Antichrist" is a bit of a misnomer. Yeah, Christ and he had a little tiff at the Christmas party, names were called, fingers were pointed, but the office newsletter says they're playing in the golf tourney together, so maybe they've patched it all up."
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Thursday, December 24th, 2009
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beatonna
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It being Christmas Eve and all, I was thinking of this Christmas story and drew it up. I meant to draw it nicer, but didn't get time. It's about family.
( under the cut, because it's big )
If it helps to understand it better, I am the second oldest of four girls.
Merry Christmas, everyone! To you and yours.
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Comments: Read 95 or Add Your Own.
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sexualcabinetry
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May you not get this.
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sexualcabinetry
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SUCCESSFUL RICE BALL SHINE GET! 100% LUCKY AWESOME!
As some may know, I like Asian food a lot. Possibly more than any other ethnic cuisine. For some time now, I've been struggling to make orthodox onigiri. Then, I learned the horrible dirty secret:
They cost like $3 and take literally no practice to do correctly. I am ashamed that for years I just assumed it was some sort of ANCIENT JAPANESE SECRET.
I think, however, that I prefer to use jasmine rice over sushi rice. I am now seriously, and with no shame whatsoever thinking about Rice-a-Roni onigiri. Seriously. I might as well just build myself a sweatlodge and call myself "Medicine Running Deer White Thunder", cause there's nothing more satisfying to a nerdy white man than bastardizing a cultural distillation.
Hell, I could just take off the seaweed and call them "Celtic Rice Bread" or something and sell 'em down at the co-op for $15 a pop. Hippies will buy anything if you add "Celtic" onto it.
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Comments: Read 4 or Add Your Own.
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Wednesday, December 23rd, 2009
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sexualcabinetry
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I, for one, am quite glad that the Smurf PVCs are back. I've been wanting some new ones for some time.
Man, so, a statement I made on POE about Frank Herbert being the last nail in the coffin of science-fiction-as-social-criticism seems to have struck a chord. POE being what it is, there's not much of a way to really link you back to the original argument, but the gist of the statement was, essentially, that Herbert himself was not a villain, merely his slavishly devoted plagiarists.
I think the highlight of the argument was when somebody demanded to know why I didn't think Ursula K. Le Guin was science fiction... I gave up at that point.
Nerds is nerds, and you can't change that.
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nedroidcomics
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My friend Emmy made a shocking discovery recently; someone in Japan is totally ripping off my comic! Fortunately she has a friend who knows a little bit of Japanese so he helped translate it into English. It's a little rough but it gets the idea across. Still, can you believe this??
( Read more... )
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Comments: Read 114 or Add Your Own.
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beatonna
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A Scottish cartoon, since I am back home for the holidays.
I'm well acquainted with the tune "Lord Lovat's Lament," since you hear it around these parts every time anyone has to pick up a fiddle and learn something. But you know, it's one of those tunes you know so well, you pay no attention to it, it's just there in the back of your head.
Then one day, I was looking up a bunch of works by Hogarth (the best) and came upon this portrait of 'Lord Lovat'. The lovely old tune and that devily face, they didn't match. So I wanted to learn more about him!
Lovat (Simon Fraser, born 1697 - there are about a million Simon Fraser Lord Lovats) really epitomizes how reading Scottish history can make you want to tear your eyeballs out, or laugh because it's nearly a farce it's so nutty. Either the people involved are disastrously loyal, or disastrously duplicitous. Everything is a disaster, but it's a hell of a ride.
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Comments: Read 54 or Add Your Own.
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Tuesday, December 22nd, 2009
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sexualcabinetry
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Alright, so I figure that now I'm safe to start reporting on some of the crazy people that come into the store I work at on a regular basis. I think I'll start with Skinny Peter Lorre.
Skinny Peter Lorre is a kid who appears to be about 23-24, doesn't appear to have any regular employment, and constantly comes in wearing dirty/ratty clothes. I call him Skinny Peter Lorre because he does indeed look like a skinny Peter Lorre, but if he didn't have hair, he'd also look quite a bit like Count Orlock. He's deathly pale... paler than I am (which is really saying something), and possesses a pair of GIGANTIC, OWL-LIKE EYES. Huge eyes. Like, stun you with headlights eyes. Also, he has some sort of unplaceable Eastern European accent, which he takes great pains to hide. Only occasionally will I be able to pick it out, but it's there. He's definitely one for the book.
S.P.L. comes into the store about five times a night. I don't know if he comes in during the day, but I assume not, since he doesn't look like much of a day person. His main situation seems to be that he uses the store I work at for his sole source of shopping needs. He routinely drops about $20-$30 dollars a day on junk food... mainly candy and chips. I'd theorize he's on drugs, if only because he looks like it, but there's just so much going on here I have no real definitely response. Considering that nobody really lives nearby (for a few blocks at least), and he doesn't wear any identification cards on lanyards to tell me he works nearby, I can only assume that he's a dealer.
Anyway, S.P.L. is a fascinating character.
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sexualcabinetry
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Hello.
I am quite certain that most of you know that I hate Christmas.
"Why?", you ask, silently.
BECAUSE I BELIEVE WE ARE AS A CULTURE ARE FORGETTING THE TRUE MEANING OF CHRISTMAS.
That's right.
FOR IT IS ON THIS SACRED NIGHT THAT WE WERE GIVEN JINGLE CATS. WE ARE TRULY A BLESSED EPOCH INDEED, FOR THE LORD HAS WAXED GENEROUS UPON OUR SOULS.
I shall keep it's truth in my heart all days of the year.
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Monday, December 21st, 2009
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asciiskull
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Turns out that delivering packages in 4 foot snow a handful of days before Christmas is hard work. Who knew?
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Sunday, December 20th, 2009
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sexualcabinetry
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m looking for a bento box, it cant be pinku (thats japanese for pink) or any girl color. It has to be of 2 or more kotoba (thats japanese for 2 compartments) and has be be chibi (small) sized. And has to be really kawaii (cute). Also It has to be about 10-20 bux. And you have to post pics of it first (i want to make shure it's kawaii [cute]). And it would be nice if it came with matching chopstick holder (WITH chopsticks). OH! and it CANNOT have any cartoon pictures, or be made out of plastic. It has to be made of ceramic, or something like that. Also it would be nice if it was made in japan. and not in china or corea (korea) or whatever. I have found a bento box similar to the one im describing in e-bay, but it was 1 kotoba, and i dont want my gohan (rice) to touch my other things (it can get wet and i would not like that, plus 2 compartments looks more kawaii)!
DOUMO! ^__^;;
I have always wondered whether or not these kids actually believe the Japanese had never had a word for the color "pink" before English came along.
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Comments: Read 1 or Add Your Own.
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taleya
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From TVTropes (I have no mouth) 'And I must scream...' section:
This also happens to the Weeping Angels in "Blink". They turn to stone when looked at by any other being, including their own kind. They get tricked and end up standing facing each other, turning them to stone forever.
and then some bastard adds:
* Or until that lightbulb burns out...
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Comments: Read 9 or Add Your Own.
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Saturday, December 19th, 2009
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pablowapsi
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a note from the kitties:
The week before Christmas we were found living in a groundhog hole on the side of the road in Salem, Michigan. Beside us were the seven unfortunate bodies of our brothers and sisters, frozen and starved, but we managed to survive!
We will be making our first trip to a veterinarian (whatever that is) on Monday and we are going to be vaccinated, tested for infection and likely treated for mild frostbite to our kitty-toes. Our foster-mom says this is going to cost quite a bit of money, as we also have worms and earmites.
There are two of us, a female black-and-white and a male brown tabby-and-white. We are both domestic short-haired kittens between the ages of 5 and 8 weeks old. We will be ready to go to new homes once we are healthy and at least 12 weeks old. We are both pretty awesome at keeping our waste in the litterbox and we are getting better at cleaning ourselves now that our foster-mom has showed us how (with a washcloth, not her tongue.)
If you can spare a paypal of $1 (or more) or if you are local to ann arbor, michigan and would like to donate pop cans to our Kitten Can-Can drive, you would be contributing to our health and wellbeing. If we can raise enough, our foster-mom is going to have us spayed/neutered before we go to good homes! We don't know what that means but Boy! Doesn't it sound fun?!
a note from emily:
-- The female is younger smaller and more independent than the male. She is very playful but willing to cuddle quietly. She is definitely the caretaker. She cleans her brother and keeps an eye on him. She currently has a habit of shivering when she's purring. Depending on finances we may have to have her tested for nerve or brain damage as she suffered from hypothermia when we picked her up. I will post frequent updates on her condition on my kitty-Twitter @EMJKitties.
-- The male is more of a cuddlebug. He insists on snuggling and will lie on his back with his toes in the air if you pet his belly.
Thank you for your time and help. All paypal and contact can be sent to Emily at emilymargaretjenkins@gmail.com
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Comments: Read 4 or Add Your Own.
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sexualcabinetry
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"I was attracted to your smarts and nerdiness," she says. And then tells me how the attracted she is by the new guy she's found's normalcy in comparison.
Not really sure if that's a compliment or an insult now. No idea. I'm not going to dwell on it.
Not enough stars in the galaxy for him wearing a black Member's Only jacket and a bow tie as a tuxedo.
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Friday, December 18th, 2009
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sexualcabinetry
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At long last and great expense to my person*, I have finally tracked down a copy of People Take Warning! Murder Ballads and Disaster Songs.
Compiled by none other than Tom Waits himself, this beast of a compilation (3 discs) spans the width and breadth of the expansive... murder ballad... and... disaster song... genre of the early 20th century. The discs are divided up with "Man vs. Machine", "Man vs. Nature" and "Man's Inhumanity to Man", three great divisions if e'er there were.
Check it out... it's bleak and dreadful misery for the whole family!
*Not really and not at all.
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Comments: Read 2 or Add Your Own.
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Thursday, December 17th, 2009
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nedroidcomics
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Doodling. The eternal struggle continues!
EDIT:
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Comments: Read 25 or Add Your Own.
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gwalla
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It's looking more and more like the Wachowski Bros. got lucky once.
Just saw Ninja Assassin last night. It's worth it just for what must be the lamest ending theme ever. "Listen to the voice of Buddha", guys? Really?
Anyway, movie: dumb as hell but pretty fun. Almost as ridiculous as Kung Fu Zombie, though not nearly as insane. Certainly gorier, though the gore is so over-the-top that it becomes cartoonish, like Dead Alive. People in this movie spray gallons everywhere: cutting off a finger launches more blood than is actually present in a human body. And they love (read: overuse) the effect of blood splattering against the screen, though it has an orange-ish hue that makes it seem more like the result of getting a spastic kindergartener hopped up on Pixy Stix and letting him loose with a bucket of red tempura paint.
The ninja in this movie fail at stealth. They can do all of this cool disappearing-into-shadows stuff, but whenever a bunch of them were sneaking up on somebody in a group, they whisper a lot really loudly. Guys, people can hear you when you do that. And pretty much all stealth and secrecy goes out the window by the time ninjas are running all over the road and getting hit by cars.
The Law of Conservation of Ninjutsu in in full effect in this movie, though it's relative to the number of opponents. One ninja is a murder machine, and a group can take on an army, but that same group vs. one guy will have a hell of a time of it, and a zillion ninja at their home base drop like flies. You can even see it in effect in individual fights: in one fight Raizo takes on about six other ninja and totally slaughters them with nary a scratch until he's down to one, who's suddenly able to go toe to toe with him.
The movie bogged down whenever it paused the action for some plot or flashbacks (tons of flashbacks in this movie). The plot is pretty thin, and full of holes. It's not so much a case of Fridge Logic as reaching-for-the-Junior-Mints logic. How has a group that'll run out into busy traffic to catch a guy and pelt a car with shuriken* able to stay secret for thousands of years? How can a guy whose first attempt to assassinate some fat guy went horribly wrong and ended up with a brutal brawl (highly reminiscent of the opening of Casino Royale BTW) suddenly turn into Lord King Badass a few minutes later? How can an army with a bunch of APCs and Humvees sneak up on a mountain fortress that is clearly shown as being accessible only by a narrow path with cliffs on all sides? How can you not laugh when a character says in all seriousness to somebody trying to kill him, "Whatever they're paying you, I'll double it!"
The female lead is mostly ineffectual and not very interesting. It's really Raizo's movie, so during the early scenes that focus on her I found myself waiting for the movie to get going again. Her boss was kind of likeable at least.
On the other hand, Sho Motherfucking Kosugi, bitches! His lines were mostly hokey but he still came off as threatening. Also, he has Akuma's teleport dash from Street Fighter.
Quick trailer reviews: The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus looks like it has a bunch of nifty visuals, and also Tom Waits as the Devil. Cool eye candy at the very least. Sherlock Holmes looks like it may rival Disney's Hunchback of Nortre Dame in terms of Hollywood completely missing the point. It does have a few amusing bits, though; it just has jack-all to do with Arthur Conan Doyle.
Incidentally, the Shattuck Cinemas in Berkeley (at least, the theater I was in) are now equipped with love seats instead of the usual theater seating, and bean bag chairs in the front. WTF? Not complaining, but, it's just weird. They had built-in cup holders and everything, so it's clearly not like how the Parkway has a bunch of old furniture: this stuff was made for theaters. Is this the new trend?
*BTW, is it just me or is shuriken a really terrible weapon for a group trying to keep people from finding out that they exist? It's highly distinctive, and you use it by throwing it away.
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Comments: Read 6 or Add Your Own.
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pablowapsi
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Noooo! I have no way to know who sent the blu-ray player from my wish list because there was no info in the packing! The player came only in the box it would be in at the store!
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Comments: Read 4 or Add Your Own.
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sexualcabinetry
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New userpic. One more example of that awesomely graphic old-skool staff illustrator stuff Nintendo used to do.
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Comments: Read 3 or Add Your Own.
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Wednesday, December 16th, 2009
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beatonna
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Some holiday comics! The Kiss Elves return.
Oh and I am posting journal type comics on twitter sometimes. If you are on twitter I am @beatonna
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Comments: Read 83 or Add Your Own.
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taleya
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Watching 2012 at the moment. I'm not sure if I want to point and laugh, or swear and throw things
Protip: If you're standing on the Huckleberry ridge when Yellowstone erupts in a full-force VEI8 pyroclastic blast You will instantly die.
And no, you cannot fucking fly a light plane out of a pyroclastic flow.
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Comments: Read 14 or Add Your Own.
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Tuesday, December 15th, 2009
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Wednesday, December 16th, 2009
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taleya
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Everyone in this world is fucked in the head. You just have to figure out how someone is fucked in the head. If you can't deal with it, don't have them in your life. If you can deal with it, never ever hold it against them.
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Comments: Read 1 or Add Your Own.
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Tuesday, December 15th, 2009
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maritzac
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Ookay so.... yeah. My vacation started on Monday. I guess I did forget to mention it.
Scheduled return of CRFH will be, most surely, on January 12th.
But I'm going to be posting comics. Well, not new. I'm going to be posting outtakes. You know, rescripts that are out of canon but nonetheless amusing.
Depending on the response I get this might be a new permanent feature of CRFH.net.
Also, before this weeks ends, I'm going to be posting the 4th chapter of MIA. So keep checking!
In the meantime, Missing in Action!
Chapter 1: http://www.crfh.net/fic01.html
Chapter 2: http://www.crfh.net/fic02.html
Chapter 3: http://www.crfh.net/fic03.html
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sexualcabinetry
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OH LOOK IT'S A WINTER FESTIVAL OF SOME SORT
So I had a chat with a pair of annoying non-conformists, who explained that although they don't believe in God or any sort of religious institution, they still want an excuse to give presents to their kids, so they've created "Penguin Day", which is apparently a celebration of the day penguins return from the ocean to mate.
And while this is not as needlessly complicated as celebrating a virgin birth in a barn, or a magical candelabra, or some sort of observation that it's darker than usual, it is compounded by the fact that there's children involved, who will someday wonder why absolutely nobody else on the planet gives a fuck about their penguin-based celebrations.
God I hate everybody and everything everywhere. Just a genuine seething boil of disgust.
If all you want to do is give presents, do you really need an excuse? If you're going to celebrate something, especially something you know is a bullshit worm excuse, why even bother? Celebrate whatever's easiest. I begrudgingly put up with Christmas because it's just not worth the time or effort necessary to not. It's just easier.
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Comments: Read 3 or Add Your Own.
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Monday, December 14th, 2009
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johnforster
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Hey, 2009 isn't over yet, but I figured I'd guess what will be featured at next year's Oscars... or more specifically, what I WANT to be featured. You know the drill.
Best Picture
The Hurt Locker
Animated Feature Film
The Fantastic Mr. Fox
or
Coraline
Actor in a Leading Role
Jackie Earle Haley for Watchmen
Actress in a Leading Role
Meryl Streep. For Julie & Julia.
Director
Quentin Tarantino for Inglorious Basterds
Visual Effects
Industrial Light and Magic for Star Trek
or
Image Engine for District 9
Sound Mixing
Ben Burtt for Star Trek
Music (Score)
Michael Giacchino for Star Trek
or
Bruno Coulais for Coraline
Of course, none of these will probably make it onto the actual list. Unfortunately Oscar bait tends to work, so expect a lot of praise over Emilia. :/
I don't see Pixar winning anything this year, even though there wasn't anything particularly wrong with Up. Coraline and Fantastic Mr. Fox were just better movies in every way. Coraline is also the only movie that has used 3D as an aesthetic instead of a marketing gimmick. So I think it should win based on that achievement alone.
For best picture, yeah, Hurt Locker. Even though it lost focus halfway through it was a fucking good. Super suspenseful and not a typical "wah-wah war is hell" Iraq movie.
As for worst movie... for me, it's a toss-up between Transformers 2 and The Hangover.
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Comments: Read 2 or Add Your Own.
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nedroidcomics
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It's getting colder here, so I decided to draw a sexy beach picture to ward off the snow. Enjoy!
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