various | puppet wrangling

Monday various

Indian entrepreneur turns pachyderm poop into paper. Yeah, I think I’ll probably stick to my Moleskines. [via]
Gosh, Mark Twain really didn’t like Ambrose Bierce’s Nuggets and Dust Panned Out in California:

…for every laugh that is in his book there are five blushes, ten shudders and a vomit. The laugh is too expensive.

Call me crazy, though, but now I sort of want to read it.
Why is Warren Beatty so determined to hold on to the rights to Dick Tracy, even if he’s never going to do anything with them?
Blue eyes are not actually blue? A little weirded out by the idea what I actually have are transparent eyes. [via]
And finally, Ray Bradbury: prune salesman. No, seriously [via]:

Today is Harry Houdini’s birthday. In honor of that, here’s a look at his Scene and Prop List. [via]
I don’t know… ordering the removal of a mural depicting your state’s labor history from the lobby of your state’s Department of Labor seems like kind of a dick move. [via]
As, frankly, do these new farm “protection” bills discussed by Mark Bittman — although, there, there’s some dangerous precedent being set:

The Florida bill would require anyone wishing to photograph a farm to first secure written permission from the owner. And what if they donâ€™t? First-degree felony. The implicit goal here is to deter and criminalize damning undercover exposÃ©s….The bill would also make it illegal for an agenda-less passerby to snap a picture of a farm from the side of the road, but my best guess is that those â€œcrimesâ€ might not be prosecuted quite so diligently.
The Phantom Menace in 3-D? Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me…oh, god, what is this? Like the at least the sixth or seventh time? Shame very obviously on me, George Lucas, but I will not be going to see this. [via]
And finally, an interview with Terry Jones. He discusses, among other things, Monty Python‘s less than certain start:

I mean, even right up until the middle of the second series John Cleeseâ€™s mum was still sending him job adverts for supermarket managers cut out from her local newspaper.

Twenty-or-so questions with comedian Mike Birbiglia. On what makes someone a real New Yorker: “The willingness to live within ten inches of someone else at all times.”
So much for that new Dune movie.
Sperm whales may have names. [via]
Would you pay $50 a month to rent original artwork?
And finally, Warren Ellis asks artists to re-imagine the Fantastic Four. Chip Zdarsky’s contribution, the third at that main link, would likely substitute Dr. Doom for Dr. Heiter, but a lot of the reinterpretations are equally interesting.

“The government is always going to go after the guy with the most money, regardless of culpability…” The Forfeiture Racket is a lot worse than you might think. I don’t have a lot of sympathy for convicted criminals who lose their property, particularly property used in the commission of a crime. And my first thought, when I read about an accused large-scale meth dealer who might lose his beloved comic book collection (the link that led me to the one above), was well, good, if he’s convicted, he probably should lose his property. But forfeiture laws go way beyond that, down all sorts of crazy, corruption-filled paths.
But yes, by all means, let us cut funding to poison control. [via]
Oh that Chris Brown…still a class act.
Okay, I’ve got to admit, this is a pretty neat zombie T-shirt.
And finally, I’m no copyright expert, but I think inscribing a passage from James Joyce into the genome of a synthetic microbe is covered by fair use. The Joyce estate, apparently, does not agree. [via]

It will probably come as no surprise that McDonald’s new oatmeal is actually sort of bad for you. [via]
Or that the TSA’s full-body, backscatter radiation scanners are quite likely worse for you than the TSA’s faulty research earlier suggested. [via]
And speaking of radiation — as it seems we must, daily, given the unfolding disaster in Japan — how close is your home to a nuclear power plant? Me, I’m just under fifty miles from Indian Point. [via]
Was Doctor Who villain Davros actually created by a 13-year-old boy in 1972?
And finally, the Monty Python Guide to Being a Better Boss. I’m not entirely convinced I’d want to work for this person.