Month: April 2009

Random 10 4/17

Last week. This week:

  1. “Season of the Witch” by Richard Thompson (orig. Donovan), guessed by Glen
    So many different people to be
  2. “Heave-Ho” by Smash Mouth
    She says these punks have to go
  3. “The Case Continues” by Ute Lemper
    The weapon was a phone call in the dead of night
  4. “Talking Old Soldiers” by Bettye Lavette
    I may just be an old has been to some
  5. “Loser” by Monow (orig. Beck), guessed by Eric B.
    Kill the headlights and put it in neutral
  6. The ghosts of sorrow haunt the deep
  7. “Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy” by Queen, guessed by Eric B.
    I’d like for you and I to go romancing
  8. “This Piece of Poetry Is Meant to Do Harm” by the Ark
    What you call peace to me is a call to arms
  9. “Midnight Radio” by Dar Williams (orig. Hedwig & the Angry Inch), almost guessed by Kim
    And all you strange rock and rollers
  10. “Grey” by Ani DiFranco
    I feel right at home in this stunning monochrome

Good luck!

Wednesday various

  • This is easily the oddest story I’ve read all day:

    Saudi police say they are investigating a hoax that has seen people rushing to buy old-fashioned sewing machines for up to $50,000.

    The Singer sewing machines are said to contain traces of red mercury, a substance that may not exist.

    I’d never even heard of “red mercury” before this. [via]

  • Speaking of William Gibson — I wasn’t, really, but that link above came from him — Maureen F. McHugh offers some thoughts on “Cyberspace” and how Gibson got it wrong, at least by our modern, now-real-world definition:

    But more interesting to me is that Cyberspace was initially envisioned as a place you went into. It turns out it’s not that at all. Cyberspace is the organization of your experience when you are using a linked interface. So when you’re in your car, using your GPS, you’re in cyberspace, right there on the freeway. Using you smartphone to check Twitter, you’re in cyberspace. We don’t go to cyberspace, it comes to us. It overlays our world and our experience. It changes our perception of space and time.

    This is equal parts neat and terrifying.

  • I spent way too much time today immersed in the #badscifi thread on Twitter. But I also loved these alternate plot descriptions. My favorites are easily:

    ALIENS: An unplanned pregnancy leads to complications.

    DOCTOR WHO: Elderly man serially abducts young women.

    TERMINATOR: An unplanned pregnancy leads to complications.

    Obviously, plenty of these come with spoilers, so be forewarned. [via]

  • Here’s something I’m wondering: If, as American Apparel is now claiming, Woody Allen’s reputation was so tarnished by sex scandal as to be worthless as an endorsement, why did they ever use it as such?

  • There’s been a lot written about “AmazonFail” the past couple of days, but I think John Scalzi sums it up quite nicely: “…people rarely freak out in a moderate sort of way.”

Happy thoughts (2)

So I may not have picked the very best week for this happiness meme. If you follow me on Twitter (or Facebook, where my Twitter feed, um, feeds), you know that my mother is in the hospital right now, having been admitted finally late last night for gallstones. She’s scheduled for surgery sometime this afternoon, to have her gallbladder removed. It’s a pretty routine procedure, especially if they can operate laparoscopically, but I’m nonetheless worried for her. I spent most of yesterday out of the loop, my father calling from the hospital with updates when he could, after work just hanging out until he got home a little before midnight. I’m at work now, but I’m keeping in touch. Hopefully, they’ll be able to perform the surgery without complication and release her this evening or tomorrow morning.

So, things that made me happy yesterday… It was a long and stressful day — work, my mother, crazy young woman on the train home, sort of electrocuting myself a little when I unplugged my laptop last night — but I don’t know that I’d call it a bad day, or a day without happy moments. I was comforted by the kind words from friends via Twitter and e-mail. I watched — quite unexpectedly; it came on HBO just as I was sitting down by myself to dinner — In Bruges, and quite liked it. (Tasha Robinson says of the movie: “If Guy Ritchie sat down, took a couple of deep, cleansing breaths, and put as much thought as energy and style into his films, they’d look almost exactly like this.”) And I thoroughly enjoyed this week’s episode of How I Met Your Mother. (“We are the Knights Who Say…You’re fired!”)

So, maybe not a great day — but then, I’m not the one who spent all of it at the hospital, or who needs surgery. I’m hoping today will be better for all of us.

Tuesday various

  • It’s been said that the human brain is sort of hard-wired to see faces everywhere, even where there are none there. I find it amusing that we’re now designing software that can be equally fooled. [via]
  • Of course, that’s not the only thing humans are designing software and robots to do. We’re also, apparently, building robot suits. This is equal parts cool and goofy looking.
  • I’ve never really been tempted to get a tattoo, mostly because I can’t think of a particular design I’d want to carry around with me forever. That said, these science and science fiction tattoos are pretty cool. Free lifetime subscription to the first person who gets a Kaleidotrope tattoo! (Lifetime of the zine, not of the subscriber.) [via and via]
  • Sometimes I think maybe I picked the wrong month to visit Chicago. If you’re there next month, May 9th specifically, Terry Jones will apparently be hosting a screening of Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Sounds like fun!
  • And finally, following up on Gwenda Bond’s recent thoughts on sci-fi foodstuffs, I see that over at Tor.com Jason Henninger is starting a new series on science fiction cuisine. While meanwhile Chris McLaren shares some interesting thoughts on spun sugar and other marvels of our modern age.