Evidence that I actually want to punch everything

Last night I had a dream that I was escaping from Venice via a secure military installation with a clone of Neal Diamond.

Let me backtrack.

I was flying through Venice for some reason, but I missed my connecting flight. In anger, I fought with some guy in the airport. The judge ruled that I was mentally unstable, so I was confined to leave Venice. Now trapped in this majestic Italian city, I was forced to punch out a lot of uppity pickpockets. They were persistent.

In my apartment building, I met a woman who wanted to leave Venice covertly and hired me to escape with her. She was smuggling something out in a cradle. We hopped a motorboat piloted by a clone of Neal Diamond, crossed the lagoon, and landed in a Bond-inspired military base---rather than anywhere else on the shore.

The dream ended with a montage of us fighting through the military complex by the most lowbrow tactic: while people were shocked from seeing Neal Diamond, I punched them. Hard.

If anyone wants to make a major motion picture out of this, please give me a cut of the proceeds. I'll even take a shitty cut.

Key quotes from the Christmas adventure

Mom: "There are no reasons for anything."

Dad: "Lava lamps speak to people."

Christmas comics

My favorite comic, possibly ever, is from Penny Arcade:















But, given the season, we should all be wary:












And go to Canada. More holiday-themed Wondermark here.

Holiday robot choreography

SLYT:

Web public service announcements

If this came as a poster, I'd buy it and display it!
Via boingboing.

Too much data

I fear that this is our future. The data we generate will take 100 times longer to evaluate than it did to create.

Police Slog Through 40,000 Insipid Party Pics To Find Cause Of Dorm Fire

DD[A]R

Dance Dance American Revolution!
If only historical conflicts could have been resolved this way.


Via Gizmodo, original artist unknown.

Photorealistic paintings

I recently came across the phenomenon of photorealistic paintings and they are fantastic.
What I like most is the water effects: another shower, swimming reflections, splash, underwater swimming. What's interesting is the visual trick here: my brain reconstructs it as mist on a window or light reflected off the undulating surface of water, but it's actually juxtaposed differently-colored pigments. So cool. I'd love to see one in person.

Escher fountain

This fountain has an Escher-inspired illusion: the water appears to flow uphill!
Check out Makezine for details of construction.

Down with this sort of thing

Hah.

Brüno

I saw Brüno this week. It was as offensive as one might expect, with the bonus of being an appalling presentation of Americans as greedy, baby-exploiting, homophobic idiots. I'm surprised that Sacha Baron Cohen hasn't been hurt doing one of these stunts yet. (Tank Riot wondered the same thing.) At times it was uncomfortable merely to watch, so I can't imagine how horrifically uncomfortable the unknowing rubes he tricked into the scenarios felt.

My advice? Go re-watch The Matrix instead.

David Sedaris parody

A comedy group called Weak Nights did this sketch, answering the age-old question: what if David Sedaris delivered pizza?

It's accurate -- they even got his tone and vocal delivery right. I want to know how the beady-eyed parrot entered the story!

Via MetaFilter.

Harry Potter VI Preview

I just got out of a preview showing of the sixth Harry Potter film. I have but a few words.

Spoiler alert: Snape kills Dumbledore.

Propaganda posters

I don't know why, but propaganda posters are fun to parody. And so easy! I loved A.'s non-propaganda poster project from senior year, and I like this:Via BoingBoing.

Meaning of life? Konami code!

Oh! I messed up the code. Can I restart?From boingboing's offworld.

Squid!

This reminds me of the "Mega Shark Versus Giant Octopus" trailer. If you haven't seen it, GO SEE IT NOW.Via the Fuck Yeah Cephalopods tumblr.

Geek pride AND towel day!

Today is both geek pride day and towel day. These holidays have non-disjoint sets of celebrators, so perhaps geeks can celebrate both by carrying a towel around?

Reinterpreted spam

Eliott Burford reinterprets spam with sketches:Sometimes I will read a spam title in the wrong frame of mind, and interpret it pretty much like this.Via MetaFilter.

Robotic sheep-shearing

No longer the realm of fiction (a la Wallace and Gromit's A Close Shave), there is now a frightening mechanized sheep-shearing robot/torture device. You can see a full, and unsettling, video of the process after the jump.

Wood-fired brick ovens: another life goal

Today boingboing taught me that there is an entire nerdy subculture of guys who construct elaborate brick ovens to cook better pizza. These range from using a few bricks to upgrade an in-house oven to major construction projects. So many nerdy pastimes, so little time!

Neil Gaiman April Fool's

Neil Gaiman is famous enough that he was featured in a few different April Fool's jokes. Famous enough in science fiction/literary circles. He highlighted the inappropriate and appropriate ones on twitter.

VATICAN CITY - Today the Roman Curia announced that the beatification of Neil Gaiman had been completed, putting the writer one step closer to the official recognition of his sainthood. These steps were carried out despite the fact that Gaiman himself has repeatedly denied being a saint, pointing out that he was not Catholic, not really religious and, most importantly, not dead.

"Really, I'm not dead," said Gaiman when reached at his home. "Not even the slightest little bit. This whole sainthood thing has become something of a bother, with little old women with rosaries joining the usual contingent of Goth girls holding vigils on the west lawn. If you happen to run into Pope Benedict XVI, please tell him that the whole thing is quite silly and somewhat inconvenient."

Really, he's not dead. Or if he is, he figured out how to twitter from beyond the grave -- how cool is that?

Gmail autopilot

As more and more everyday communication takes place over email, lots of people have complained about how hard it is to read and respond to every message. This is because they actually read and respond to all their messages.

I don't actually read and respond to all my messages, though I do maintain inbox zero, mostly by either replying right away or failing fast. I welcome Google Autopilot! -- an automatic system that can read and reply to my emails and gchats, leaving me free to bumble about in a non-electronic existence. This feature was created by CADIE, Google's new post-singularity intelligence.

From the FAQ:

What happens if a sender and recipient both have Autopilot on?

Two Gmail accounts can happily converse with each other for up to three messages each. Beyond that, our experiments have shown a significant decline in the quality ranking of Autopilot's responses and further messages may commit you to dinner parties or baby namings in which you have no interest.

The Onion: still funny

Obama Depressed, Distant Since 'Battlestar Galactica' Series Finale

Since the end of the series, Obama has reportedly brushed off key budgetary decisions, ignored his wife and children, and neglected his daily workouts, claiming that he no longer cares if he lets himself go "just like Lee did before the rescue on New Caprica."

Drool over this power-tool

This drill is amazing.
Sure, it has a counterweight to help stabilize the action of cutting through cinderblocks like butter. But nevermind the counterweight -- my guess is that people as small as me don't even weigh enough to use the drill. It would just spin us around.

On a separate note, the high-speed photography used to capture this image is fantastic. [via Gizmodo]

BSG finale: wrap-up

I am disappointed that they didn't explain Thrace. Like, maybe the writers came up with half an hour of flashbacks to explain her. And then they thought, "Oh no! This finale is three hours long and we only have two hours of airtime! Let's cut this, we don't need it." So Thrace magically vanishes.

The fact that angels are real -- witness the 6 and Balthar angels, visible to Balthar and 6; also witness Thrace, apparently an angel and visible to everyone -- makes a strong case for the fact that the writers are in favor of monotheism, despite the pervasive polytheism throughout BSG.

Overall, I am satisfied. BSG was really excellent for the first ~2 years, and the last 4-5 episodes. The middle part was bad in the way that Lost is bad: lots of unexplained and badly-written stuff. How can the cylons be intelligent enough to engineer artificial biological life, but stupid enough to think that a virus can be transmitted via radio waves and the uploading/reincarnation process? I liked the internal consistency of the show, and of course I like robots. And Diplomacy-like tension, backstabbing, etc. The premise was excellent, and the execution was very good.

I would recommend this to others. Goodnight, sweet internet, goodnight.

BSG finale: commercial break 10

Many weird flashbacks. Were these really necessary to tie up the loose ends? Sure, Balthar's dad was a farmer, but... ok. Fine. Very poetic. Nicely overdubbed music.

Of course Hera is mitochondrial Eve. All of this has happened before.

I am glad that Aibo conducting an orchestra got to be the last robot word. Also that weirdly anthropomorphic female robot.

BSG finale: commercial break 9

Thrace is still unexplained. Where did she go?

After five years of dying, at last Laura is dead. Well, no one can say they didn't see it coming.

BSG finale: commercial break 8

The old man did get to fly the last viper off of Galactica. How satisfying.

So back when Kara was aimlessly jumping following her "gut" and painting all over her bunk, she could've been only minutes away from jumping straight to real Earth. Too bad they didn't trust her enough then. But somehow they did now, after much more crazy behavior.

The first thing they're going to teach the natives to make? R. thinks, booze. So that in thousands of years, we can all be alcoholics.

BSG finale: commercial break 7

"How is that possible? Human beings naturally evolved on a planet billions of light years away. The odds against that are astronomical." Yes they are. Listen to that gut feeling. This is not entirely satisfactory writing.

"Our brains have always outraced our hearts. Our science charges ahead. Our souls lag behind." Too rhetorical. I can't believe that. (Plus, it sounds like some theories I've heard of jetlag: waiting for your soul to catch up.)

Setting the centurions free? BAD IDEA. Sometime in my 30s our planet will be overrun with centurion descendants!

Why fly the ships into the sun? Now if the other group of cylons comes back, they have to defend themselves with sticks! Just leave them in orbit! For crying out loud! I guess it's ok because they're ending the program; otherwise, that would be the first episode of the next season.

BSG finale: commercial break 6

Data flow in the water? Sounds like electrocution. Before, 8 had to manually insert a cable into her arm to do data transfer! And of course the chief is angry about his wife's murder which was previously cast as a suicide. Of course. Why didn't they try to defuse that before mind-melding! A dramatic way to find out.

The chief gets the short end of every romantic stick. Sucks to be him. Cuckholded, betrayed by robots and humans alike. I feel bad for him. He honestly tries to do good.

Where are humans going to end up? Answer: present-day Earth. They already went to the UN earlier this week!

BSG finale: commercial break 5

Can the cylons control when they stop projecting? It seems like always being in the operahouse would be bad in the middle of a battle. Like, you can't see the bullets, because they aren't in the operahouse... but they can still kill you.

Also, man, it is dangerous to be a toddler in the middle of a gunfight.

All of the operahouse visions are coming true! This is so cool. Also, everyone, human and cylon and halvsies alike, can project into the operahouse. So maybe they are all cylons, as R. expects. The parallelism of the visions with reality is awesome. Very satisfyingly literary.

"Everyone in this room has experienced things they can't explain or fathom." Yes. The product of terrible writers. 13-year-old girls strike again! Bwa ha ha. Actually, this speech by Balthar in the CIC is a good justification for all his various roles and speechifying for the past five years.

This truce seems exactly like the last truce, where they got resurrection and human bodies in return for the cylons not eradicating humanity. But... this has all happened before. This will all happen again!

BSG finale: commercial break 4

"We never should have trusted her." "Trust didn't enter into it. I simply miscalculated." Reminds me of my current diplomacy game. (Next turn in 53 minutes. Go Mexico!) If the cylons can really upload/download their minds so freely, can't they just upload Boomer and then read her mind to see if she is planning betrayal? Or use her mind to simulate the upcoming situation, and see if she'll defect in the moment? Lots of of John C. Wright options here.

Another outstanding plot point: Balthar sees visions of 6. 6 sees visions of Balthar. AND NOW THEY BOTH SEE VISIONS OF EACH OTHER. Yes! My theory: Balthar and 6 are going to go get Hera. As per all of those operahouse vision/dreams.

Theory immediately proven wrong as Boomer returns with Hera, paying back the "one" she owes the old man. Then we have a flashback to explain that, because we didn't know.

The dying woman comforts the dying soldiers. X marks the spot. The terrible spot. I cannot imagine actually having that job. How sad that the former president's days as a religious icon/prophet are over; she might be able to heal them with her faith.

BSG finale: commercial break 3

"I suppose the more important question is, 'what am I doing here? what was I thinking?'" Maybe you should have thought of that before you signed up for a suicide mission, Balthar!

The cylon theme for hybrid-to-Sam connection. Mmmmm.

Oooh! Cool tactic! Jump from inside the ship to the other side of the colony. Neat-o. I do not think that Galactica is going to make it back from this... these space-tactics remind me of the first time I read "Ender's Game" by Orson Scott Card. Three-dimensional strategy is so complicated. I feel like my long life of playing board games hasn't prepared me adequately for when I jump into the future and have to help protect the human race from invading aliens. (Or robots we create ourselves.)

It is as I foretold: they are using Galactica as a ram. Nice. you'd think that they could have moved those poor guys who got skewered, but I guess not.

Boomer is crazy. Let's hope she stays reasonably sane and can keep Hera alive.

BSG finale: commercial break 2

Sam's getting plugged into Galactica's dreydus, etc. To interface with the other hybrids. And slow down their defensive response. This is the way that the cylons first attacked the colonies! Nice parallelism.

Why does scrolling red text have to be projected on the walls above Sam's tank? He can't see it. What's the point? (Also, cool rotating bed-in-a-tub. It's like a robot hamster wheel.)

Why is Balthar staying? R. suggests, "Maybe vanquishing the cylons, and the very survival of the human race, will depend on having sex with as many cylons as possible. Then he can be useful."

So far everything is in-line with my prophesy.

BSG finale: commercial break 1

Whoa. Drunk old guys. Drunk and vomiting old guys.

Nothing is revealed yet. In fact, nothing has happened.

I wait.

BSG finale: what I expect

There are a number of questions that require resolution in the next two hours. And some gaping plot holes that will take everything the newly-revived writers have to fix.

How were there two Thraces? (R. thinks that the twist ending will be that everyone is a cylon.)

What's with the cylon homeworld? It never came up before. Where did it come from? Why was it never mentioned? Why can't we all go live there?

Where do the humans go? They have to go somewhere, after all.

Hera had better serve as an important plot point for something more than her stem cells. (Relatedly: why can't we just cure cancer now? Why is it still even an issue? And on the subject of scientific questions that Balthar has already solved, why did they abandon the fully functional and accurate cylon test from season one?)

Sam is going to... wake up? It's pretty obvious that, since he's already wired into Galactica and all the plot points are set up, he is going to jump Galactica to the cylon fleet (or homeworld). And then I think that the "grand goodbye" the admiral has planned is that he's going to drive Galactica into the other fleet and crash it into their ships. This was foreseen in some recent episode, in shots of Hera playing with the tiny strategic ships they have in the CIC, and... driving Galactica into the other fleet and crashing it into their ships. This might be how Hera is important. She can see the future. Or something.

Boomer has to be explained? ... or it could just be left that she's a crazy flip-flopper.

More to come at commercial breaks. (Note: they're having the actors reflect on BSG as a life-changing experience. Best comment: everyone else is talking about love, friendships, and work experiences... Sam says, "It's great to be on BSG. Because chicks dig cylons.")

Food network police drama

I have always found amusing the idea of a TV channel dedicated to food. Apparently I am not alone.

Sword Swallowers Awareness Day

Sword Swallowers Awareness Day was February 28. I know I missed it, but I thought it was worth mentioning anyway. Take some time out of your day today and thank the sword-swallower in your life. (Hat tip: R.)

APA dating website

Selected personals from the American Psychiatric Association's dating website.

"Don't mock me"

Love to laugh? Then you're not my type. Female katagelophobe seeks female geliophobe for serious, no-nonsense relationship.

Change we can believe in

Science!
Via Boing boing.

Take my heart

No, really. I cut it out of my chest and soaked it in poison just for you to ingest.

This is the english translation of Boccaccio's Decameron's day 4, tale 1, in which Tancredi, Prince of Salerno and father of Ghismonda, slays his daughter's lover, Guiscardo, and sends her his heart in a golden cup: she pours upon it a poisonous distillation, which she drinks and dies. C'est l'amour.

Via LOL Manuscripts!.

What's in a name?

As it turns out, having an unpopular name makes you more likely to become a juvenile delinquent. The study is an obvious abuse of statistics, but it does explain a lot of urges I feel. As it turns out, Ernest is a dangerous dangerous name. Just as naming your child Diogenes nearly guarantees that he will be a philosopher, naming him Ernest ensures that he will be a criminal. You are all warned, and the government probably has tabs on me.

Crossbow!

Wii Crossbow (via Gizmodo)!The faux finish is what really gets me.

Mandelbrot teddy bear

Via Boing Boing.

The Recently Deflowered Girl, illustrated by Edward Gorey

Everyone and their brothers was blogging about this yesterday, and many of them also emailed it to me. I appreciated it, too, every time I got it.

It was available on livejournal here yesterday (a livejournalist had found it on his landlord's shelf, and scanned it), but it's gone today (and the user is deleted!). So sad.

It is currently duplicated here.