Four young deer saved by fishing boat

[Thanks to TCGirl]

Four young deer saved by fishing boat, article.

Pretty bright of them to think that the boat and people might be salvation. Most animals in danger are just in mindless panic.

Olympus tells lenders cash crunch looms

Olympus tells lenders cash crunch looms, article.

Of course I hope Olympus will survive and prosper. It has been an important camera company, in the development of compact gear especially. Olympus OM-1 was a shock to the camera industry in the seventies.

Though I did think they flopped a bit with digital, with the four/thirds format, which is smaller than the normal APS-C format, and much smaller than the full-format sensor which many pros prefer. They attempted to make pro cameras and lenses, at very pro prices, with cameras which weren't all that much smaller than other DSLR cameras despite having the smaller sensor.
It's only in the most recent incarnations of their cameras for the Micro Four Thirds format, for example the Pen Lite, that I think they have really hit on something great. But that may be years too late to save the company.

Alyson Hannigan is pregnant.

Alyson Hannigan is pregnant, article.

They named their firstborn "Satyana"?? Oh. Good things kids are always kind, and fundamentalists never take things too literally. So I'm sure she won't be teased in school about that, or give any misgivings about the family to the hardcore Christian factions.

Even if the name has no relation to Satan at all, I wouldn't put too much stock in that fact, in a world where you no longer can use the word "niggardly" (which means being cheap. A niggard is a miser).

Fight the Blacklist: A Toolkit for Anti-SOPA Activism

[Thanks to Anna.]

Fight the Blacklist: A Toolkit for Anti-SOPA Activism, article.
Congress is debating dangerous legislation that would give the Department of Justice unprecedented power to “blacklist” websites without a trial and give Hollywood copyright holders a new way to shut down a website’s financial services for alleged copyright infringement. It’s nothing short of a bill to create a U.S. censorship regime, and it’s moving fast.
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Throwable Panoramic Ball Camera

[Thanks to Ian] 

To be frank I'm not impressed with the quality of the stitching of the images, but it's early days and it's all done in-camera and in a cheap one, so...



Anyway, I think it's a good example of how cheap electronics is changing a field and making things which we could not imagine a few years ago.

Another example: a couple of years ago, William Gibson had as an essential plot element in his book Zero History (written in 2009), lighter-than-air toy ballons with cameras, they silently "swam" through the air like a fish through water, one of them shaped like a manta ray. You controlled them with an iPhone app. In the book these were very expensive cutting-edge things, but now, just a couple years later, you can buy such things on a healthy Christmas-present budget.

F.A.A. Approves iPads in Cockpits, but Not for Passengers

F.A.A. Approves iPads in Cockpits, but Not for Passengers, article.

Exciting blue lights

Fantasy novelist number 670:
"... OK, now the two wizards get into a battle. Now, how would wizards battle? Well, the great thing about fantasy is that anything can happen, so let's do something original and amazing. Oh, I got it: let's have them stand there and throw blows at each other, like two boxers except with blue lights instead of fists!"

Comic book writer number 2556:
"... OK, now the two wizards get into a battle. Now, how would wizards battle? Well, the great thing about fantasy is that anything can happen, so let's do something original and amazing. Oh, I got it: let's have them stand there and throw blows at each other, like two boxers except with blue lights instead of fists!"

Movie script writer number 7921:
"... OK, now the two wizards get into a battle. Now, how would wizards battle? Well, the great thing about fantasy is that anything can happen, so let's do something original and amazing. Oh, I got it: let's have them stand there and throw blows at each other, like two boxers except with blue lights instead of fists!"

What to Get Your Girl for Christmas

What to Get Your Girl for Christmas, article.
Oftentimes, the items she points out, while you’re out on the town, or shares with you, whenever you’re together, would be good indicators of things that she enjoys and will give you plenty of ideas to choose from. Mostly, it is how well you have paid attention...
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By the handle

A mother's advice to her grown daughter, who is going into the male-dominated cooking trade: "Remember, with either a sharp knife or a dull knife or a man, always grab it by the handle, and it will be far more useful for you."

It's good to let it out

War on leather for tough guys

[Thanks to Pascal]

Activists Missing After Declaring “War on Leather” at Motorcycle Rally, article.

Two others, previously reported missing, were discovered by fast food workers “duct taped inside several fast food restaurant dumpsters,” according to police officials.
“Something just went wrong,” said a still visibly shaken organizer of the protest. “Something just went horribly, horribly, wrong.”

I guess it's a lesson about trying to use force on somebody who is more able and willing to use force than yourself.     :-)

“...motorcycle gangs are one of the biggest abusers of wearing leather, and we decided it was high time that we let them know that we disagree with them using it…ergo, they should stop.”

ROTFL.

...protesters arrived at the event in a vintage 1960′s era Volkswagen van and began to pelt the gang members with balloons filled with red colored water, simulating blood, and shouting “you’re murderers” to passers by. This, evidently, is when the brouhaha began.
“They peed on me!!!” charged one activist.

ROTFLMAO.

When confronted with the allegations of force-feeding the activists meat, using them as ad hoc latrines, leaving them incapacitated in fast-food restaurant dumpsters, and "farting on their heads", the organizer declined to comment in detail. 
"That's just our secret handshake," he assured the news reporter.

[Can't... breathe...]

“I…I was trying to show my outrage at a man with a heavy leather jacket, and he…he didn’t even care. I called him a murderer, and all he said was, ‘You can’t prove that.’ 

[Gurgle...]

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Eagles and weasels

Don't let it end like this. Tell them I said something.

           -- Pancho Villa, last words

Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines.

           -- John Benfield

As an adolescent I aspired to lasting fame, I craved factual certainty, and I thirsted for a meaningful vision of human life - so I became a scientist. This is like becoming an archbishop so you can meet girls.

           -- M. Cartmill

Foolish writers and readers are created for each other.

           -- Horace Walpole

"Chicks with guns"

Mmm, delish. From Lindsay McCrum's book Chicks With Guns.
Book site.
Thanks to tOP.

--
I don't find guns very interesting, and the title would normally bring to mind such mindless fare as this. But this shot and particularly the woman, is just wunderbar.

Actually I find an aesthetic disconnect from a beautiful woman to a gun. The latter is inherently the opposite of life-affirming, since it's designed simply to kill. If not repulsive, then boring.

"Walk Hard" and Jewel

"Walk Hard - The Dewey Cox Story" is a good parody of musician bios like Walk The Line. It's not the greatest comedy ever made, perhaps, but it has a lot of good points and solid lines. It particularly skewers the sentimentality such movies sometimes veer into.

And it has this too-short appearance of Jewel. I had no idea anybody could put so much beauty and sex-appeal (and humor) into one sung word!



(I'm amazed at the quality of this clip, not the least the sound. I filmed it off my HD TV, hand-held! (Ooh, short clip and part of a review, hope this comes under "fair use"...). It was filmed with Panasonic GH2, which is particularly aimed at being a good video camera, and it seems they succeeded very well with the built-in mics.)

A nuts story

Sandra visited New York many years ago, and went to see a show called "Witness the great Schnabel demonstrate his masculinity". The show consisted amongst other things of Schnabel, an exceptionally well-equipped man, crushing three walnuts, whacking them with his manhood.

Sandra did not come back to the Big Apple until forty years later, and to her surprise there was a fresh poster of the great Schnabel. She went again, and Schnabel, now a bit lined and grey, performed his acts, only this time he used coconuts instead of walnuts.
Sandra had to know, so she went backstage to ask him why the change. "Well," Schnabel said, "the ol' eyesight is not what it has been, you know."