January 1, 2013 – 5:30 pm
In keeping with our ancient tradition, here’s this year’s selection from the searchphrases that brought readers to our doorstep in 2012: man in chicken suit flying on hang glider lwica lwica race map the boy who cried sheep thats a moray freedom go to hell ice tricks darkie toothpaste pelicans eating other birds no bikini [...]
October 19, 2012 – 8:20 pm
Here’s an odd little story — a million maps found in a 948-square-foot cottage about to be torn down.
October 9, 2011 – 10:08 pm
The Northeast has been enjoying a fantastic spell of weather lately. Here in the Outer Cape, today was simply perfect: low humidity, cloudless azure skies, warm sweet sunshine, and temperatures in the upper seventies, with a fragrant, balmy breeze as gentle as a baby’s breath. At Newcomb Hollow Beach, it felt more like August — [...]
February 14, 2011 – 10:23 pm
I wonder how many of you this happens to: I see a headline like “Clinton To Announce New Special Envoy To Afghanistan And Pakistan“, and the Clinton that comes to mind is that taller one, the one who doesn’t really even have a job any more. I have a feeling that doesn’t just happen to [...]
Here’s a timely collector’s item, if you can find one. (Hat-tip to my colleague Yaniv Sarig.)
Here’s an interesting item: Iowa State University Distinguished Professor of Psychology Craig Anderson claims to have demonstrated conclusively that playing shoot-’em-up video games “increases aggressive thinking and aggressive affect, and decreases prosocial behavior.” This is, of course, what various concerned sorts have been saying all along, although I had for some reason thought that the [...]
February 22, 2010 – 11:37 pm
lich: southern dialectal survival of O.E. lic “body, dead body, corpse,” cognate with O.Fris. lik, Du. lijk, O.H.G. lih, Ger. leiche “dead body,” O.N. lik, Dan. lig, Goth. leik, from P.Gmc. *likow.
February 7, 2010 – 11:19 pm
Recent correspondence has called back to my attention a perfunctory little post from last April, which despite its brevity led to one of our longer and more entertaining comment-threads. Here.
January 31, 2010 – 11:57 pm
I’m slowly recovering from whatever it was I had — some sort of virus, I suppose, that triggered a general shutdown of major bodily and cognitive subsystems. Between that and a slip in the snow Thursday morning that caused fresh and debilitating damage to a recent orthopaedic injury, I have spent most of the past [...]
November 14, 2009 – 12:18 am
I have to say: YouTube is amazing. Here’s something for you music lovers “of a certain age”: a clip from the old TV series F Troop, in which the folks at Fort Courage were visited by a musical act calling themselves The Bedbugs. As it turns out, the leader and drummer of The Bedbugs are [...]
November 3, 2009 – 11:14 pm
I’m old enough to remember Pan American World Airways, which throughout my early years was America’s foremost airline. I flew Pan Am on many occasions (including, once, all the way to Japan for a recording project), and through the misty lens of memory I recall the service and comfort being far superior to the cattle-car [...]
Here’s an Escheresque curiosity from the Web. I’m sure there is some simple trick to creating things like this, but I have no idea what it is.
If you are in New York City today, you can take in a twice-yearly astronomical phenomenon: Manhattanhenge. Learn more here.
Here’s an odd little video clip, showing something or other having a swim in Lake Champlain.
If you enjoy this sort of thing, there will be rather a spiffy celestial display on Wednesday morning. Details here.
April 15, 2009 – 11:40 pm
For those of you who take an interest in our national pastime: a rare baseball oddity occurred this past Sunday, and our former skipper, Joe Torre, was at the heart of it. Read about it here, and watch the video here.
February 26, 2009 – 11:30 pm
There’s an interesting little item in the news today: paleoanthropologists have found Homo Erectus footprints 1.5 million years old that record the earliest known example of anatomically modern human feet — feet that are designed solely (so to speak) for walking, and not for grasping. It is hard to imagine anything more evanescent than a [...]
September 8, 2008 – 9:30 pm
I realize that this may have limited appeal for most of you, but I just can’t get enough of this sort of thing. At the very least, it’s further proof that there is something for everyone on the Web.
This will be of zero interest to any of you, but in my little corner of Gotham the corks are popping. Here’s why.
April 29, 2008 – 10:15 pm
It is always interesting to me to see which of these posts will generate comments, and which will not. Often a probing and painstakingly drafted essay on a subject of ancient and universal interest will attract no more notice than, say, an important scientific discovery or a bit of good news from Iraq; but dash [...]
April 23, 2008 – 10:50 pm
According to this story in today’s New York Times, Europe is looking to increased use of coal to meet its energy needs. As you might imagine, this news is not being received warmly by those who are concerned about levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide. However, according to this item by Australian scientist-engineer Philip Chapman, we [...]
March 25, 2008 – 10:36 am
From today’s CodeProject newsletter, here is an assortment of useful software that you can get for nothing.
March 17, 2008 – 10:01 pm
There are a great many roadside oddities in America, often associated with equally odd people. One such dyad I’ve only just learned of is the Coral Castle, in Homestead, Florida.
December 23, 2007 – 6:38 pm
Well, today is the first full day of winter, so it’s time for some spiritually uplifting and seasonally appropriate material. Have a look here.
December 19, 2007 – 12:51 am
I’ve learned a new word: whalefall. It refers to the effect of reduced buoyancy upon deceased cetaceans, and came up today in an interesting and educational context.
December 2, 2007 – 12:57 am
Zoologist and evolutionary theorist Richard Dawkins has become a household name lately — not because of his decades of creative academic work, and his outstandingly informative and accessible books on biology and the Darwinian paradigm, but because of his in-your-face denial of God — which has probably, on balance, earned him more enemies than supporters [...]
November 29, 2007 – 1:49 am
Readers of the New York Times will be familiar with Verlyn Klinkenborg, who contributes marvelous little essays to the editorial page. He lives on a small farm in upstate New York (“upstate” being a preposterously Gotham-centric term for the 97% of New York State that isn’t part of New York City or Long Island), and [...]
November 8, 2007 – 12:03 am
I’m too lazy to write anything tonight, so it’s Hitchens to the rescue. No, not that Hitchens, but his brother Peter, who writes for the UK Sunday Mail. The item at hand deals with a pet peeve of my own: the pretentious and unnecessary revision of familiar place-names. In my day Ceylon has become Sri [...]
October 29, 2007 – 10:20 pm
Which animals live the longest? That’s right: clams. And according to today’s Physorg.com newsletter, we have a new champion. Learn more here.
October 17, 2007 – 9:36 pm
If you’re like me — and I have no reason to assume you aren’t — you’ve been wondering: what is it really like to be an English policeman, anyway? Well, wonder no more, thanks to the latest addition to our sidebar (courtesy of the estimable Deogulwulf): The Policeman’s Blog.
October 8, 2007 – 11:03 pm
I must say this is certainly NOT how I imagined that the early days of October would be. Five weeks ago I scribbled a post in which I gave thanks that the summer’s sticky warmth was soon to give way to the clear cool days of autumn. “The most beautiful months of all”, I said. [...]
August 14, 2007 – 10:56 pm
I’ve been working long hours this week, and have had scant leisure for thinking or writing. I hate to send you away empty-handed, though, after you’ve made the effort to check in, so here, courtesy of our friend The Stiletto, is an online test of your ability to remember names and faces. I actually did [...]
At least you aren’t a seven-legged, terminally constipated, hermaphroditic ruminant.
With a hat tip to Peter Hankins, today we take a look at a simple yet outstandingly accurate piece of meteorological technology: the Weather Stone.
Well, I promised you all some froth, and here it is. Tonight we have, courtesy of my childhood friend Nick Nicholes, who now lives in a scenic vale in remotest Montana, a polka band that does Pink Floyd covers, and pretty well too. No quadrophonic mixes, though; you’ll just have to use your imagination.
April 27, 2007 – 11:56 am
With a tip of the hat to Dennis Mangan, here are some striking public-service posters from France, warning of the dangers of AIDS. Shocking, perhaps, to some, so caveat observator. As mentioned below, waka waka waka will be off the air until the weekend is over. We’ll be on the road, and I won’t have [...]
March 29, 2007 – 10:26 pm
As regular readers will know, I live in Park Slope, Brooklyn, a pleasant, attractive neighborhood of tree-lined streets and century-old townhouses the adjoins lovely Prospect Park. The area has had its ups and downs; when Nina and I moved here in 1982 the neighborhood was just emerging from many years of decline. During the Sixties and Seventies this was a pretty tough district — an Irish and Italian neighborhood with a lot of gangs and petty crime; during that era the handsome old buildings were neglected and often even abandoned. Since then, however, Park Slope has ridden the city’s rising tide of prosperity, and nowadays it’s a very affluent area, with upscale shops and restaurants, and the streets nowadays are full of attractive young couples pushing children in strollers. This is all very nice; certainly our own humble abode has appreciated gratifyingly since we took it over many years ago. But there is a dark side to all this American Dream stuff: you can’t find any place to park.
Are you planning an elegant social function? An afternoon garden party, peut-être, or perhaps a genteel soirée to raise money for a new wing at the local art museum? Don’t call the caterers before you consult this online oracle.
November 28, 2006 – 11:43 pm
I don’t do a lot of recording these days; the music industry having gone through rough times in the 1990′s, I took up software engineering, and now make my living writing code. I still do two or three albums a year, though, and I am occasionally reminded of one of the other reasons I was inclined to switch careers: the hours can be grueling. Yesterday’s session at Avatar — a new album for my old friend, the guitarist Steve Khan — started at ten a.m., and when I left sometime after one in the morning, Steve was still wrapping up a few loose ends in Pro Tools with our assistant, Brian Montgomery.
November 22, 2006 – 7:04 pm
Well, if not, perhaps it will make you stronger.
The Nietzsche Family Circus.
November 21, 2006 – 2:23 pm
For you Wodehouse fans (count me as one), here’s a topical item from the New Yorker — brought to my attention, as are so many wondrous and faraway things, by my friend Jess Kaplan.
October 26, 2006 – 2:00 pm
Here’s a heartwarming little story, and a brief diversion from weightier matters: according to an item in Tuesday’s Daily Mail, visitors to London’s St. James Park were witnesses to an epic struggle as a pelican grappled with a pigeon. According to the report, it took the enterprising waterfowl twenty minutes to swallow its peristeronic snack, which fought vigorously to escape, but ended up, apparently still alive, in the larger bird’s belly.
worth two in the bush (photo: Cathal McNaughton)
October 21, 2006 – 11:55 pm
Well, we finally made it to Michigan. We caught an 11:45 flight out of Gotham, and got to Ann Arbor in time to join the procession of the faithful down State Street to the Big House, which, just for the record, really is big — It is the largest American football stadium anywhere, and, according to this Wikipedia article, is the 29th-largest sports venue in the world (the larger ones are mostly racetracks). For today’s contest we were joined by 110,923 other spectators, and let me tell you, that’s a fair-sized crowd — numbering only slightly fewer than the population of Ann Arbor itself. And we were not disappointed; Michigan triumphed as expected, 20-6, even without the services of star wide receiver Mario Manningham, who is nursing a banged-up knee.
September 15, 2006 – 10:48 pm
Just a few odds and ends for tonight; I’m whipped. Nocturnal recluse that I am, I’m still not used to this up-first-thing-in-the-morning business, and I’ve been averaging about four or five hours of sleep. By the time Friday rolls around all I can see is a great Eye, rimmed with fire.
August 9, 2006 – 10:51 pm
We’ve all heard the suggestion that a roomful of monkeys hammering randomly away at typewriters would, given billions of years, recreate the complete works of Shakespeare. (A “typewriter”, for those of you whose brows are wrinkled solely by bafflement, is an antique mechanical device that generated crumpled sheets of paper.) It’s an interesting idea, but if you’re like me, you’ve just been too busy to try it out.
Well, the wait is over. Take a look at this. It’s not exactly instant gratification; thus far the sedulous simian simulacra have only got as far as the first 24 letters from “Henry IV, Part II”. But, as someone once said, “how poor are they that have not patience.”
I hate to keep harping on this topic, but the weather here in New York today has been particularly unpleasant. The air seems oddly compressed, and even more saturated and viscous than usual – as though it contained not just the usual summertime admixture of water vapor and filth, but also maybe some mule sweat or hog saliva. There was not the slightest breeze, most of the day, to stir the fetid broth, and the sun, visible at times through its nubilous veil, brought the whole dolorous mess to a slow and sultry simmer as the dreary day wore on. The psychological effect – to drain one of all joy, hope, or sense of purpose – is also deepened, for those who have spent a summer in New York before, and haven’t managed to repress the memory, by the certain knowledge that worse is yet to come.
Things should be getting back to normal around here tomorrow, but having just got home to Brooklyn after a long day of driving in the rain, I think that tonight we’ll just have a few links from the mailbag. First, from Jess Kaplan comes a patriotic little Java applet with an appealing Big Apple theme. Next we have, courtesy of Mike Zaharee (formerly of PubSub‘s Granite State Research Kitchen), further evidence, as if any were necessary, of what mischievous little imps the North Koreans are, and finally, thanks to Jon Mandell, we have a glimpse of the amusing discomfiture at Wikipedia as the fractious online organism tries to equilibrate in the wake of Enron blackguard Ken Lay‘s unlamented demise.
My friend Jess Kaplan has just brought to my attention an ominous datum: on this numerologically significant date, 6-6-06, the cost of the average fixed-rate mortgage just happens to be a rather unsettling 6.66%.
In a gratifying development, it appears that scientists have finally weighed in on that dimwitted question concerning the chicken and the egg. As w.w.w. readers will recall, of course, from this post, the matter had in fact already been settled.
It is extraordinarily quiet here in Wellfleet tonight. It’s been cool and grey all day, and just at dusk a thick fog crept in. The air is heavy and still, and a gentle rain is falling. It is the first day of the new Moon, and the sky is utterly back.
We live on a small hilltop on a little dirt road in the woods, about half a mile from the harbor, and although it is Friday night on a major holiday weekend, nary a soul is stirring anywhere within earshot. Even the coyotes, who often gather at night for no apparent reason other than to see how much noise they can make, are keeping mum.
When you are used to living in New York City, which is always ablaze with lights and throbbing and humming with purposeful clamor, such darkness and silence has quite an effect. Tonight seems almost actively black and quiet, and stepping outside one feels oneself in the presence of a great enveloping blotter, drawing out all that hustle and bustle so that something else, perhaps, may enter.
