Tag Archives: Friday Links

The smog in Beijing is so bad, millionaire Chen Guangbiao is selling cans of clean air. Not sure if that’s funny or depressing. Probably some of both.

We’ve long known the concept of absolute zero, the coldest possible temperature. But is there such a thing as absolute hot? Surprisingly, yes – or at least, maybe.

We Raise All Our Beef Humanely On Open Pasture And Then We Hang Them Upside Down And Slash Their Throats. My wife and I try to buy meat made from ethically treated animals, so this made me laugh.

Buttersafe explores positive male role models.

Meanwhile, PvP shows the sordid depths one man will sink to for the woman he loves.

Have an excellent weekend, Hypothetical Reader. See you on Monday!

In 1954, when science was clearly more fun, psychologists gave LSD to an artist and had him draw pictures of a face at various stages of the acid trip. The drawings are cool. The commentary’s even better.

The Penny Arcade guys make a remarkable discovery about this thing you humans call football.

PvP finds a good reason to get angry. (A guest artist did this strip, so the style’s a little different than normal.)

xkcd points out one of the difficulties of working on AI.

And speaking of artificial intelligence research, SMBC sums up exactly how I feel about the field right now.

Have a stellar weekend. See you Monday!

On November 1, the newly-discovered Comet ISON will visit Earth. The comet will be brighter than Halley’s, perhaps the brightest of the century.

Gizoogle. “Fo’ all y’all biotches who wanna find shiznit”.

Sometimes, SMBC delivers the funny. Other times, it delivers the truth.

Have a great weekend. See you Monday!

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Paul Salopek is going on a journey from Ethiopia to Argentina, a distance of 21,000 miles – by foot. He estimates it will take him seven years.

A giant squid has been filmed in its natural habitat for the first time ever. The full footage will air on the Discovery Channel later this month, but you can see a clip right here.

The Onion reports that four copy editors have been killed in the ongoing gang violence between AP Style supporters and the Chicago Manual of Style.

PvP!

SMBC!

QC!

Have a great weekend. See you Monday!

Today’s links include a selection of thoughtful treatises on global socioeconomic challenges in the 21st century, as well as a droll retrospective on Queen Victoria’s fiftieth –

Just kidding. Three SMBC’s. Enjoy them OR ELSE

uno dos tres

See you Monday!

If you like Star Trek and Monty Python, this mashup may be the funniest thing you see today. Everyone else: move along!

The ultimate First World Problem: we’re using so much data that we’re running out of words to describe it all.

SMBC imparts life lessons in the traditional way: via tombstone.

And finally, Two Guys And Guy suggests an alternate way to do your Christmas shopping.

See you next week!

I’ve branched out into a new style of calligraphy, called uncial. It’s even older than blackletter, and was used in a lot of Irish writings, among other places. What do you think? (Click to enlarge.)

On to the links…

So, that big NASA announcement? May not be so much “one for the history books” after all. The Curiosity rover found a few nonliving organic compounds…that may or may not be contamination from Earth. Keep watching, I suppose.

Meanwhile, the existence of unicorns has been proven…by, uh, the North Korean state media. Well, I’m convinced.

Penny Arcade enlightens us on the true meaning of Christmas World of Warcraft.

PvP also has a WoW comic, but they – ahem – delve a little deeper.

That’s it for this week. See you Monday, and have a stellar weekend!

Earlier this week I asked for calligraphy requests, and you responded. Anthony Lee Collins requested “The Dude abides,” a Big Lebowski quote, while my good friend Zeev went for Serenity quote “I am a leaf on the wind, watch how I soar.” Both excellent choices. Below are those two quotes, along with some others I’ve done in the past few days. Click to enlarge.

On to the links!

The single coolest thing I’ve seen all week: a German dude created this gorgeous copy of Tolkien’s The Silmarillion, illuminated by hand medieval-style, over the span of a year. Can you imagine how much the highest-bidding Middle Earth fan would pay for this?

This is old news, but it was news to me. They’re actually, finally, no-joke making an Ender’s Game movie, to be released November 1, 2013, with Harrison Ford as Colonel Graff. W00t!

Cracked.com has a list of the 6 creepiest places on earth. How about a forest in Japan where people go to kill themselves? Or a bridge (pictured above) where dogs go to die? Yeesh.

The Mars Rover has found something cool – “one for the history books,” according to NASA – but they won’t tell us what it is yet.

The ridiculously sexist question “Which programming language is the most female friendly?” gets the ridiculous answer it deserves. Flawless victory.

And finally, one more from Cracked.com, because I’m obsessed with them, apparently: a screenshot of Super Mario Bros. as played from Bowser’s point of view. Seriously: where can I buy this game?

See you next week!

A researcher claims that throughout history, Great Britain has invaded all but 22 countries. Hey, give it time. C’mon, Queen…don’t you want a legacy bigger than fancy hats?

Straight from Cracked: 6 Insane (But Convincing) Fan Theories About Kids’ Cartoons. First up: the characters in Spongebob Squarepants are the result of nuclear testing. Super Mario Bros. 3 and Aladdin make appearances too. Check it out!

See you next week.

The Creative Process, illustrated. My wife suggested I call this graph “How I Write The Blog.”

Some amazing art over here: Batman villain crossovers. Above is Catwoman + Poison Ivy. (Catnip?) Follow the link for five others, including Joker + Riddler and Mad Hatter + Scarecrow. Be sure to click the image to enlarge.

Thanks to the ad nauseum election coverage, we all know that “red state” means Republican and “blue state” means Democrat. But how did the colors get those meanings? It happened a lot more recently than you may realize.

Some encouraging news from the world of dirty politics (i.e. politics): smear campaigns don’t always work. Colleen Lachowicz, who was running for a state Senate seat in Maine, also happens to play World of Warcraft in her spare time. Her Republican opponents, apparently hoping to capitalize on voters’ ignorance of the game, ran a bunch of negative ads that made her seem like some kind of freak for living in a fantasy world and pretending to be an Orc. Well, guess what? That WoW-playing woman is now state Senator-elect. Congrats to her, and even bigger props to the people of Maine for seeing through the ridiculous FUD.

And finally, PvP reminds us of the biggest perk of being bald.

See you next week!