This was my very first solo video project. I'm quite pleased.
Thursday, December 15, 2011
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
Friday, October 28, 2011
Thursday, October 20, 2011
Thursday, September 22, 2011
I Love Carl Sagan
I am not an atheist but I love this with my whole heart. Loving God is no excuse for arrogance or intellectual laziness. We need to do a better job.
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
Women at War
"A group of young Jewish resistance fighters are being held under arrest by German SS soldiers in April/May 1943, during the destruction of the Warsaw Ghetto by German troops after an uprising in the Jewish quarter." (AP Photo)
"Specially chosen airwomen are being trained for police duties in the Women's Auxiliary Air Force (WAAF). They have to be quick-witted, intelligent and observant woman of the world - They attend an intensive course at the highly sufficient RAF police school - where their training runs parallel with that of the men. Keeping a man "in his place" - A WAAF member demonstrates self-defense on January 15, 1942. (AP Photo)"
"A girl of the resistance movement is a member of a patrol to rout out the Germans snipers still left in areas in Paris, France, on August 29, 1944. The girl had killed two Germans in the Paris Fighting two days previously." (AP Photo)
See the rest of this fantastic photo essay here
Wednesday, August 3, 2011
I Find This Strangely Moving
Zoe Keating: my favorite avant garde cellist (ok maybe she's the only avant garde cellist, but still...)
Tuesday, August 2, 2011
30 Days
Not usually my kind of thing: it's all inspirational and stuff. But it did get me thinking about what kinds of things I could convince myself to try if I knew I could quit after 30 days.
Wednesday, June 29, 2011
New Gillian Welch Album!
"It was seven years on the burning shores with Gatling guns and paint. Working the lowlands door to door like a latter-day saint" Absolutely bloody brilliant.
If you don't know Gillian Welch, you should rectify that immediately.
Friday, June 24, 2011
Paranoid Android
This guy took a bunch of random youtube covers and mixed them together into a 'meta-cover'. So great. Thanks Tod.
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
Monday, June 6, 2011
Friday, May 20, 2011
MLK on Extremism
"Was not Jesus an extremist for love?" I love that. Jay Smooth blogs about Race and Culture at illdoctrine.com
It's The End Of The World As We Know It
Eclectic Method - The Apocamix from Eclectic Method on Vimeo.
Celebrating the impending apocalypse through music and video!
(P.S. If they're right, and I'm going to hell, I'll quit my job on monday and get what I need through armed robbery. Win-Win!)
Tuesday, May 10, 2011
Monday, May 9, 2011
Fascinating, Beautiful And Horrifying All At Once
“A fireball begins to rise, and the world’s first atomic mushroom cloud begins to form, nine seconds after Trinity detonated on July 16, 1945. (U.S. Department of Defense)”
"Complete destruction of House No. 1, located 3,500 feet from ground zero, by an atomic blast on March 17, 1953, at Yucca Flat at the Nevada Proving Ground. The time from the first to last picture was 2.3 seconds. The camera was completely enclosed in a 2-inch lead sheath as a protection against radiation. The only source of light was that from the bomb. In frame 1, the house is lit by the blast. By frame 2 the radiating energy has set it on fire, and the remaining frames show the rapid disintegration of the house by the blast wave.(U.S. Department of Defense)"
"In Operation Doorstep, conducted during the larger Operation Upshot-Knothole nuclear bomb test, mannequins are seated at a table in the dining room of house number two, attending a "dinner party" thrown by Civil Defense officials who are testing the effects of an atomic explosion on houses and occupants on March 15, 1953. (AP Photo/Dick Strobel)"
"(2 of 2) After the blast, mannequins lie strewn about the room, their "dinner party" interrupted violently by an atomic blast on March 17, 1953. (U.S. Department of Defense)"
"Los Alamos director J. Robert Oppenheimer is seen in silhouette as he oversees final assembly of The Gadget at the Trinity test site in July of 1945. (U.S. Department of Defense)"
"Operation Greenhouse took place in the spring of 1951, consisting of four explosions at the Pacific Proving Grounds in the Pacific Ocean. This photo is from the third test, George, on May 9, 1951, the first thermonuclear bomb test, yielding 225 kilotons.(U.S. Department of Defense)"
My Thoughts:
I think that the scale of these events is hard to understand in our post-atomic age. We live in a world where nuclear events seem ordinary. Think about this: These explosions represented the first of their kind, outside of a star, in our solar-system's history, and we made them happen. That is spectacularly audacious. The sad/horrifying part is that we did it, not for the sake of science or understanding, but as a way to kill each other. We replicated a stellar event to kill people.
Fantastic Photo Essay at The Atlantic Monthly
Thursday, May 5, 2011
Word
Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in our lifetime; therefore we must be saved by hope. Nothing which is true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history; therefore we must be saved by faith. Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone; therefore we are saved by love. No virtuous act is quite as virtuous from the standpoint of our friend or foe as it is from our standpoint. Therefore we must be saved by the final form of love which is forgiveness. --Reinhold Niebuhr
Saturday, April 23, 2011
Most Frightening Movie I've Ever Seen
Taken from the movie "The Swiss Machine" which I saw at the traveling Banf Mountain Film Festival this year. Absolutely terrifying.
In 1938 it took the best climbers in the world 3 days to climb the Eiger. Ueli climbs it in 2 hours 47 minutes and 33 seconds alone and without protection.
I'd be angry at him for taking stupid risks if it weren't so beautiful watching him run up the side of a mountain .
Watch the clip.
Wednesday, April 13, 2011
Not for Tomatoes, Man.
I love how the simple addition of the word "man" can add a subversive subtext to this whole thing.
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
Heh Heh Heh
So I found this book on our processing cart at work today. It's not usually my kind of thing, as I have no interest in French literature, but I do love philosophy so I turned the book over to read the reviews and summary on the back.
This is the first review:
"Landy's book delivers what has gone long and scandalously missing; a philosophical analysis of Proust's incomparable book that is muscular, concise, philosophically informed and sophisticated... The book should for a long time be inescapable for anyone writing about Proust, and perhaps for anyone writing philosophically about imaginative fiction, full stop. It is that good." --Philosophy and Literature
Muscular. Inescapable. Sophisticated. Scandalously Missing.
Wow. That is a ludicrous amount of hyperbole.
So I read the next review:
"This is a reading of Proust which is as voluptuous... as it is accurate, penetrating, and richly satisfying" --Journal of European Studies
And the next:
"Incredibly erudite, yet written in a lively, clear, and witty style, Landy's book marks the debut of one of the most brilliant younger literary scholars in america today" --Thomas Pavel, University of Chicago
At first glance it seems that these reviewers couldn't possibly be reading the same book, much less an obscure book about the philosphical underpinnings of a relatively obscure (from an English-speaking American viewpoint) poet.
I mean, how can one book be inescapably muscular, concise, and philosophically informed, as well as voluptuous, penetrating, and richly satisfying; to say nothing of witty, erudite and clear?
Its almost as if the first reviewer were reading HP Lovecraft, the second D.H. Lawrence, and the third Ambrose Bierce.
At second glance it seems something darker, more Freudian, and infinitely funnier seems to be happening.
Look at these groupings of adjectives:
Missing
Muscular
Concise
Philosophical
Sophisticated
Inescapable
Voluptuous
Penetrating
Accurate
Richly Satisfying
Incredibly Erudite
Lively
Clear
Witty
Brilliant
Taken separately, they seem to be describing, in turn, an archnemesis or apocalyptic event, a steamy erotic encounter, and a spectacular after-dinner conversation.
Taken together they amount to an overly optimistic (read fraudulent) and incredibly desperate personal ad. The kind that likely masks a reality that includes dirty romance novels and way too many cats.
Best blurb ever.
Monday, March 28, 2011
Friday, March 25, 2011
Greatest Dream Ever!!!
It started out at a surf-camp being run by Laird Hamilton (epic big-wave surfer) and his kids. He was kind of mean but his kids were nice. Overall: Awesome.
Then I went rock-climbing: also Awesome.
Then Zombies attacked and we had to hide out in this abandoned house: Awesome.
Then I noticed that there didn't seem to be any (living) guys around and the girl I was talking to told me that girls are better at surviving zombie attacks than boys.
Then I remembered that I could transfom into a Tyrannosaurus Rex. So I did (It was a mutant T-Rex with big arms and opposable thumb-claws). Awesome.
Then I stomped on zombies: Amazing. There are no words. The only downside was that I kept wanting to bite them (I had all those great teeth) but couldn't for fear of infection.
My friend Kayla made this picture. (It really captures the joy and the gore, dont'cha think?)
I'm pretty sure that when I'm on my deathbed I will remember this as the best dream of my life.
Monday, February 28, 2011
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Suprisingly Intelligent Conversation for a Late Night Show
When's the last time someone mentioned David Hume on late night TV? Awesome.
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
Monday, January 24, 2011
Saturday, January 22, 2011
Friday, January 21, 2011
Friday, January 14, 2011
Thursday, January 13, 2011
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