This Happens to Me All The Time

clik

High Quality, Unadulterated, Columbian Stardust

and 6 more

Happy F'n Pi Day

y'all gonna love this (witcha spkrs on)

Really Awesome Robot Videos

Boing Boing linked to this video of a robotic "pack-mule" designed by Boston Dynamics. It's really amazing, and kinda funny, especially when the scientist dude kicks it and it stumbles sideways and regains it's balance. I explored the other robots on their site, and they're all pretty great.

I love how robot designers are taking cues from animals and insects in their designs, and it's really nice to see the things actually work. I'm sure this is just the tip of the iceberg of what we'll see in our lives, and I like the fact that these utilitarian, functional, and totally practical robots happen to be such funny and fun-to-watch creatures. It's officially the future, and the robots are kinda adorable.

The Videos:
RHex - weird thing that can walk on anything
BigDog - pack-mule quadruped
LittleDog - small quadruped for locomotion research
RiSE - a tree and wall climber

Apache! Ah Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha!!

Brave warriors, riders of the plains -
Apache 'pache boy! Apache 'pache boy!
Their land, strong earth -
They must be free -
Apache 'pache boy! Apache 'pache boy!
to live their own lives, free.
Free.
Apache!

- turn on yr spkrs -

Point Schmoint

I don't know why I had never heard The Point!(w.) by Harry Nilsson until a few days ago when Paul Clifton loaned it to me as possible material for The Wonderful to cover, but please allow me to officially go on record that I find it to be delightful. All I really knew of Nilsson until recently was "Everybody's Talkin'" from the Midnight Cowboy soundtrack. I used to have it on vinyl and it's a good song. But The Point! is something completely different and unexpected.



Apparently, the original incarnation was an animated made for tv thing, which I'd love to see, (even tho the cover art looks baaad) but I didn't know about the film at first, and the record stands on its own. It's basically a concept album in the form of a children's story. Nilsson narrates the story over background music, which, on every other track turns into a song.

The story is a (very) thinly veiled allegory about non-conformism featuring a kid named Oblio who is the only round-headed person in a land in which everyone is pointy-headed. Oblio's mom knits him a pointy hat so he'll fit in, but it doesn't work and he gets banished to the Pointless Forest, where he encounters a Pterodactyl, among other weirdos. (Nilsson pronounces it terro-dac-TILE(!) He then wanders back to the town he was banished from, where they let him back in and everyone's points melt off.

The whole story is ridiculous and it's pretty obvious that it was conceived on an acid trip, (Nilsson says this: "I was on acid and I looked at the trees and I realized that they all came to points, and the little branches came to points, and the houses came to point. I thought, 'Oh! Everything has a point, and if it doesn't, then there's a point to it.") In spite of all that, though, it's got that real 70's children's programming feel to it: drug-inspired, sort of socially educational, slightly subversive, wholesome and totally sincere.

It's so representative of the stuff I used to listen to on the old fisher price record player when I was a little kid that it brought back a lot of those memories even though I had never heard this particular story/album. I remember loving those kind of records; stories mixed with music that you could fall asleep to and have really nice dreams.

and the songs are really good.

Well, I'm Back.

Ok, so I haven't updated this thing in almost two months. Why? Well, the main thing is that I'm no longer unemployed and bored. Also, I entered a hot-air balloon race around the world, crashed in the Himalayas, got in a fight with a Yeti, was kidnapped by opium smugglers and had to stowaway on a potato barge to escape. But the main thing is my new job, I guess.

Anyway, I want to try to get back on this train somewhat more regularly, 'cause I keep finding stuff I want to show and thinking of things I want to tell. First off: this is some great video to get the ball rolling anew. have at it.