one of the biggest and most complete/intact giant squids ever found is on display at london’s natural history museum. measuring 28 feet in length, the giant squid nicknamed archie resides in a 30 foot long tank full of preservative solution and is part of the behind-the-scenes Darwin Centre tour. here’s a pic of archie in his custom built display tank. mmm … fleshy & gross. so much calamari, so little time.
Monthly Archive for February, 2006
wow - this is dope! no really. it really is dope, in every sense of the word. it puts the ‘high’ back in hi-tech. witness the ultimate hidden secret (well, not so secret & hidden anymore) underground lair for growing marijuana on a massive scale. 50 yards underground actually.
The entrance was through a secret hydraulic door in the garage that led to a concrete ramp that went about 50 yards into the ground. Inside the cave was living quarters and a secret escape hatch that led you through a tunnel that exited via another hydraulic door that opened up a rock on the outside. It was very elaborate. The set up allowed them to harvest every 60 days which resulted in multi-million dollar sales.
the underground pot lab was located in tennesee, no less. all done dirtless using hydroponics. nifty disguised main entrance with the fake shelf above. and dig that massive door! and the secret escape hatch! soo crazy! link via boingboing.
my hammer-pants wearing friend jamie sent me this link letting me know that MC hammer has a blog! yes he does! and i’m liking what he has to say. honest and from the heart. some lovely and honest words on love and being a father and what is now chapter one on the maturation of hip-hop to some audio posts too. good stuff.
my insanely talented and equally lovely & rad friends larissa martin and claudine gossett are having an art show! their amazing paintings and illustrations will be on display at the cricket engine gallery in oakland (near the lake merrit bart station). the show is titled silent dreams and it will be open from march 18th through march 26th. the opening reception is march 18th from 6pm to 10pm. you should go! click here for an online flyer
actor and all around funny character don knotts, a.k.a. barney fife, a.k.a. the incredible mr. limpett, a.k.a. the apple dumpling gang, a.k.a. landlord and fashion maven ralph furley, died today at the age of 81. thank you for the laughs, mr. knotts!
this is a full committment to tiki fireplace love! i am tipping my hat in respect to the folks at biff inc for their mad model making skills in building this cool project. the way the photos break down the build and assembly in a step by step process is a really cool resource. you can get most (if not all) of the raw supplies at home depot. very cool. from experience, i have to add to always use a good respirator though when sanding foam though, even if you’re working outside. toxins are fun.
the amazing painting style of shawn barber will be on display at the shooting gallery in SF. the show is called Tattooed Portraits and it’s running from march 4th through april 2nd, 2006. there’s also an opening reception as well as a book release & book signing party for the 112 page book featuring mr. barber’s work from the Tattooed Portraits show happening march 4th, 2006, 7pm - 11pm. you can view the front of the tattooed portraits postcard flyer here if you like.
had some issues with permalinks not working on this site. i believe that is fixed now. also, i would love any feedback on what some of you out there feel is the best spam-comment or comment-spam filtering extension/plugin for wordpress 2? preferably something you know from experience that works really well. please contact me and let me know what you think works best. i would really appreciate it. i would love to have comments working on this site. but from what i know and have seen, moderating comments is a lot of work. and i don’t want that. anything that keeps me at a computer longer than i need to be i avoid.
it’s friday. if you woke up this morning thinking ‘man, i would like to see more mean rich snobby skanky hoes get doused with flour’ then your wish has been granted. no really. as hollywoodrag informs us: paris hilton got flour-bombed. the paris of hilton was reportedly hit by four flour bombs after her catwalk appearance at london fashion week. my guess is when she saw all that white powder coming at her she got super excited! and then immediately very very sad when she learned it was just flour. wah-waaah. flour compliments of PETA as they were protesting designer julien macdonald who uses fur in his clothing line. and thank you d-listed for the pics!
if you like to laugh then you should avoid cobb’s comedy club next wednesday and thursday nights (february 22nd & february 23rd). because that’s when the very funny louis c.k. will be headlining to promote his new HBO series Lucky Louie. and therefore, if you go, you will laugh. a lot. you can buy tickets to the show via ticketweb. i recommend thursday night as that’s when i’ll be there. and you can buy me a drink ’cause tomorrow is my birthday! no joke. but enough about me … here’s a link to louis c.k.’s site for more funniness.
wow. i hope that the 4 people who read this blog made it out for one of the funnest events to take place in SF in a long time. i’m talking about that mad crazy spontaneous pillow fight that happened last night. sooo much fun! smiles were everywhere. not as much as feathers though. lots and lots of feathers. but still, a lot of smiles. as soon as the ferry building clock hit 6pm, the mayhem broke out. there were about 200 to 300+ people swinging pillows and tossing feathers with about a 1,000 people there total. pillow fighting went on until about 7pm. maybe more. but i may be off on my calculations due to all the feathers i inhaled (not even joking there) and hard pillow hits to the head. nuts!!! there’s a group photo pool on flickr for the sf pillow fight that you should check out. also see the sfgate article. and be sure to see the page of links on laughing squid as well as laughing squid’s amazing flickr photo set too.
and to top it off, for those of you who couldn’t make it - youtube has some video! sweet! i recommend watching it with the theme to benny hill playing. soo good.
with little bright lights, i am like a moth to flame. so i’m happy that this project is a fairly easy to build process. check out this lovely step-by-step instruction on making small magnetic LED throwies featured on instructables.com. cool! the LED throwies were developed by the graffiti research lab. with the addition of magnets, you can throw them (hence the term ‘throwies’) and they’ll stick to metal & cars & such. and you can click here to see a video of the LED throwies in action. link found via boingboing via makezine.
2006 should be the year you give up red meat. i’m not joking. mad cow disease is no joke. here’s a recent story that should have been front page news but wasn’t: US Meat Supply at Risk of Mad Cow. mmmm … beefy! and if you know what a downer cow is, you’ll be unhappy to hear that, according to the USDA inspector general, downer cows are entering the US meat & food supply. downer cows are supposed to be banned as food source meat. but their entering the US food supply isn’t old news. it’s just not reported, or rather it’s lied about and covered up. and a report by the agricultural department found that it could not determine whether beef slaughterhouses and packing plants obeyed safeguards designed to keep mad cow disease from reaching humans. the regulations are largely ignored. yikes! but it’s not all bad for red meat lovers. if you’re hooked on the beef, then make a smart move to only eat organic meat from free range grass fed cows, such as napa free range beef or niman ranch. you just can’t trust factory farmed meat anymore. period.
it’s half past 2pm on valentines day. not only is this going on in less than 4 hours, but there’s still time to send some email valentines to your loved ones (or despised ones). i made four semi-lame to moderately indecent ones to brighten your day (3 pulled from an old set ‘deemed no longer funny’ by the internet council). meanwhile, the interns working around the clock here have found only two - two - decent links with any savvy valentines even worth mentioning. and you may have already seen them. but here they are anyway …
Star Wars Valentines! yes, sci-fi worked it’s way into valentines day. imagine that. but there are some funny ones on the somethingawful site. thanks guys!
Law & Order Valentines! these are our favorite. big style points too. i like to fill out my law & order special victims unit valentines while watching re-run after re-run of law & order. helps me focus.
i’m really liking this anatomical diagram of the monster Gamera. it’s from a book titled An Anatomical Guide to Monsters. sounds lovely! found via tinselman and then boingboing. there’s a bonus if you click on the image of gamera as it takes you to a photo gallery from a rad exhibition called little boy: the art of japan’s exploding subculture. check them both out.
my friend vulcan (no, not this vulcan, but definitely this vulcan, and this vulcan here, and this one, and this one too) is having a solo show at the luggage store in SF. the show runs from february 8th to march 4th 2006. there’s a reception for the show this friday february 17th from 6-8pm. if you are able, you should go. you will get to meet a legend. i was able to check out the show last friday and it’s great! the word ‘graffiti’ doesn’t do it justice. here’s a hi-res version of the flyer for vulcan’s show for you to download, print, & post up at work. why aren’t you doing that right now?
dooooodes …. it’s almost tuesday the 14th. we told you what’s going on tomorrow (see the animated gif on the front page too?). and so did the good folks at laughing squid. and now sfgate. just ask google about it. oh boy, gonna be good. today is monday the 13th. it’s almost noon. at lunch, why don’t you head out and pick yourself up a nice spare pillow (preferably a down feather pillow). if no pillow, then at least bring a camera to document the mayhem. see you there!
… about you and your internet experience. for reals. so much so that he’s filmed looong introductions and interviews and posted them on his website to let you know all the ka-razy adventures and things going on in the world of kevin costner. let’s pour a candid cup of talk, with kevin costner: hey there kevin coster! crazy - i almost didn’t recognize you, here, at your own website. it’s so weird to find you here too, at kevincostner.com, of all places. kevin costner, do you sometimes get lonely? sometimes, kevin, i wish i had someone to talk to about hostess twinkies and cupcakes. do you? i have so many questions i want to ask. mainly, why waterworld? why?
hmmm. just had a very minor earthquake here in the south bay (morgan hill, ca to be precise). small shaker - house made some quakey-noises. ground shook for about 1 second at around 8:25pm.
UPDATE: here’s a screenshot of the quake area. looks to be in the 2.0/3.0 range. quick image provided by the USGS earthquake hazards program for northern california.
late at night, toffee is your friend. yes. you know this. it is always there for you. even when everyone else has left, toffee is there. so good. toffee. sometimes it’s there, not as fully formed toffee. but as separate toffee ingredients of butter and sugar and sometimes chocolate. they see you and they are waiting to be united as the magical toffee. go to them … now. unite those special ingredients now with this easy english toffee recipe from cooking for engineers. yay! make the weekend special. isn’t it about time you spent some time … with toffee?
tired of how long it takes to do your nurb modeling? then maybe a home 3D scanner from next engine is what you need. a small desktop scanner for $2,500. that’s pretty crazy! connects directly to your PC using a USB port. system includes an autopositioner and a parts gripper to help everything match up. having used a few 3d scanners before, this is impressive (if it works). you could always just spend a mere $70,000 to $240,000 on something more robust. link via futurefeeder.
this link sent in from lolly: series of photos graphically illustrating the disturbing effects of working in advertising. yikes. i think it’s meth use myself. but advertising does burn you out. scary. stay in school, kids!
another gem video. this one is how every friday should be ending for you. wrap up your week at 4:45pm (or 4:20, whenever) and have you and your co-workers gather around and re-enact part of (or most of) this video. i insist. please enjoy the vicacious vigor of men and women in shiny outfits singing and dancing for a cheesy ghengis khan video tribute. & thank you wmfu’s beware of the blog - you are my favorite!
a very cool, highly functional, & quiet design for renewable energy coming from england. the quiet-revolution is a vertical-axis wind turbine capable of generating 6kW. because of it’s blade design and single moving part, the quietrevoltion is not only quiet, but it allows for some cool lighting effects as well as display/advertising options. link via treehugger.
if you’re bored at work today, it’s nice to remember that there’s plenty (52!) of good get your war on comics to read and laugh and cry about. mostly laugh. maybe cry. it’s your choice. and apparently get your war on is now a musical - with sell out shows and rave reviews. cool!
car-nage - get it? ahh, humor for friday. anyway, there’s nothing gory here. safe for work. & it has a soundtrack too! this video clip looks like it’s taken from one fixed camera in the same underground tunnel. a tunnel which seems to be cursed with many, many car accidents. or maybe the drivers know the camera is there and they are showing off (sort of like the magic mountain rollercoaster)? i may be wrong on that. check out that bus though - yikes!
these may look like ordinary letters. they are. and well, they really aren’t. these letters were created by machines using multiphoton absorption polymerization (MAP). the machines are so small you wouldn’t be able to see them. in fact, the letters are thinner than the width of a human hair. and, for the first time using this MAP process, they are able to be coated in metal:
A human hair is about 100 microns wide. Each of these micro letters, created in the Fourkas lab, is 30 microns tall and 20 microns wide. With their new method of incorporating metal, the Fourkas team was able to coat the”U” and “D” with copper.
the work is being done at the university of maryland (hence the UMD) and will pave the way for intricately smaller machines, switches, and devices. please read the article on physorg.com when you get a chance.
from the folks at bootie in SF, get your hot little hands on this best of bootie 2005 mash-up compilation cd, showcasing 20 of bootie’s favorite mash-ups from the past year! complete with album artwork - score! there’s a direct link and a bittorrent link in case that one is down. thanks bootie! i like you!
i believe in the magic of photoshop. but the giant rabbit here is not photoshopped - this rabbit is real! and here’s an even bigger photo. wow. this is herman. he weighs in at 22 pounds and measures a little over 3 feet. he’s a breed of rabbit called german giant (how appropriate!). this is his owner, Hans Wagner, struggling to hold him up. from the NY Post article:
“I don’t feed him an unusual diet,†said Wagner. “He goes through more than his brothers and sisters, but he eats the same food mix. His favorite food is actually lettuce. He can never get enough of it.â€
this is really lovely!!! jeff soto artwork - alive and animated - and taking over los angeles. the video is called Los Angeles - Let’s Be Friends & it’s directed by the los angeles based animation collective three legged legs (lots of goodies to see on the three legged legs site!). radness!!! big thanks to the always powerful fecal face for posting this up!