The Ultra-Deep Field - Most Important Image Ever Taken

It's difficult sometimes to remember our place in the universe. I once had the Hubble image (or part of it), the Ultra-deep field, as my wallpaper because it allowed me to stare at something every day that could leave me paralyzed with a sense of awe.

This video walks you through the process and it's worth every minute.

Phone Sex Photo Essay

Mother Jones has an amazing photo essay on the phone sex trade.

The pictures are interesting, but the words are enlightening. Enjoy.

Little Shambles Friday YouTube

Hey, let's start something else new that I won't follow up on!

Since my daughter - known to you as 12-year-old Little Shambles - is starting to fascinate herself with the internets, I thought every Friday we could take a look at what she's looking at YouTube. No, this is not from Bluecoat K9 logs, but from what she tells me she likes and looks at.

This is Fred (on Father's Day):



It is pretty damn funny, even if the speed of it almost sets off a panic attack. Allow me to counter with something I haven't poked at you yet but has been one of my pieces of wonderfulness.

Happy Tree Friends

Pastors Challenge IRS

From ABC News:

But when [Minnesota pastor Gus] Booth addressed the members of his Warroad Community Church one Sunday in May and told them, "If you are a Christian, you cannot support a candidate like Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton for president," he very much knew he was violating the law. He even wrote a letter to the IRS explaining what he had said and challenging the tax collection agency to do something about it.

Good. Roast that motherfucker.

This is a man, leader of a church, a parish, a flock, who has tangible sway over his followers, his sheep. He - or his church leaders - formed Warroad Community Church and was granted, as a privilege of the United States of America, tax exempt status as a religious organization. There was this one thing, though, that he agreed to wholeheartedly to keep all his monies: don't endorse politically. Period.

This is not to mention that Gus is blasting against the two candidates who have not been to war. This is church. This is Christianity which is based on the Commandments of Moses and pushed through the Greatest Commandments. And Thou Shalt Not Kill does not have an asterisk after it, no matter how ig/noble the war, nor does "Love your neighbor as yourself."

Strip that church. Do it now. Or we will have churches all over America pushing both ways. And we will open the floodgates to a nightmare between now and November.

Gummy Bear Song - English ...Hungarian?

So this is what the kids are doing on YouTube. In an ongoing effort to keep up with Little Shambles, if she wants to show me a video on YouTube, I'm game, and get particularly giddy when she shows me something I saw six months ago. That is not the case here.

From Wikipedia:

"I Am Your Gummy Bear (The Gummy Bear Song)" is a novelty dance song by German composer Christian Schneider and released by Gummibear International that received international and internet meme success, in part, due to its corresponding 30-second video clip.[4][5] The song has since been released in at least seven languages and has virally spread worldwide with more than 30 million plays of the corresponding videos on YouTube and MySpace.[4] With the song ready-made for ringtone use one critic commented "he's the ultimate cross-platform, cross-cultural phenomenon YouTube was designed to unleash."

You can, of course, view the magic in the English version, but I prefer its original Hungarian here ("Itt van a Gumimaci").




...then again, it's mildly reminiscent of the original Hamster Dance from about a decade ago.

30 Seconds with Craigslist

Found on Craigslist:

19 year Old cutie LOOKING FOR RIGHT now Need Grocery Funds - w4m - 19 ([Location])
Reply to: pers-724714102@craigslist.org
Date: 2008-06-18, 8:00PM EDT


Please no game players need to do this NOW kids dont have cereal for morning brandi NO ENDLESS EMAILS OR BS

I really don't know if I'm supposed to be amused or horribly affected. I think it's a little bit of both.

Obama, the Antichrist

Plenty of people in America don't like Obama. Some dislike his policies, some dislike that he's a Democrat, some don't like black people, and some are wondering if he's the Antichrist.

I'm not joking. Run a search on "Obama antichrist" and it will turn up a lovely slew of sites, most likely including the blog Barack Obama the Antichrist.

Unfortunately, many of the attacks we'll see on Barack Obama in the months leading up to November's election will be from people searching, searching so hard, to kill Obama's character in a way that - while unproven or ridiculous or absurd - is simply a form of knocking him down without being directly racist.

As dirty as it is, many Americans don't like black people. The tradition of the Republican party is non-inclusiveness. So in order to appeal to rational human beings who think hate and killing is wrong, those against Obama are furiously resulting in tactics that attack but do not include race.

I'm not a sucker and I don't believe that every attack on Obama is racism redefined, nor do I believe that he necessarily has all the experience necessary to be a great president. But given our 2 choices: geriatric confusion or n00b step-in, I'm shooting for the n00b. Let him in, let him win, let him occasionally fail. And let us have a voice to rail against it. But let Barack Obama into the leadership instead of the Bomb Iran, Keating guy.

McCain is not a good man. I think Obama is.

And, no, I do not believe he is the Antichrist. And if McCain's Hagee did, he'd let it happen for the delicious return of Jesus X2.

Firefox 3.0!

As a writer, I can't stand any writing that uses "!" at any time. If the language is forceful, the "!" is implied.

I'm using "!"

Firefox 3.0, bitches!

If you didn't think that FF already pwnd MSIE 7, then you will make that connection this round. Huge betterment. Download here to affect the Guinness Book of World Records most downloads in one day record.

Now, people! Firefox!

Unless, of course, you operate Safari on a Mac. Lucky.

So where's my Pimpzilla skin for 3.0? Sweetest skin evar.

What the Customer Actually Wanted

I think I saw this a while back and can't seem to find the source. Enjoy while I continue to look.

NOM California: Yay Bigotry!

The National Organization for Marriage California sent me some hate email in the form of a celebratory call to action:

We've succeeded in the first phase of the most critical battle in the nation over the future of marriage. On Monday, the Secretary of State of California certified that we had the signatures necessary to get the California Marriage Amendment on the ballot. Thanks to the efforts of everyone who prayed, donated, volunteered, circulated or signed the California Marriage Amendment petition, the voters of California will have the chance to overrule our Supreme Court and protect marriage in our state.

So, horray for NOM for bigotry! Horray for inequality! Horray for ignorance!

The email goes on to scare the homophobes even more, that if you live in California that means more queers and if you don't then your state could be next. Queers I say! Queers!



So if NOM California is so bent on limiting the rights of same-sex couples, why is their token heterosexual couple composed of a woman and a shorter, wispy-haired manifestation of chemotherapy androgyny, photoshopped with a butt-chin?

MoveOn.org "Not Alex" Video

I actually have to thank Andrew Wilkow for alerting me to this video. Of course, he calls it "nonsense" when I find it emotionally compelling. And it's not just McCain's "100 years" comment, but his lackadaisical tossing around of the bombing of Iran that will drive this country past its volunteer military capacity, forcing a draft. And anyone who can't put those pieces together is blinded by their own nonsense.