Outside The Interzone: Dec 26, 2010

Friday, January 7, 2011

Warhol, Updated

In the future, all Republicans will have fifteen minutes of fame, which they will use to run for president. (Paraphrased from Upper Left, via Balloon Juice.)

David Byrne, "In the Future," from Music For The Knee Plays. Lyrics:

In the future everyone will have the same haircut and the same clothes.
In the future everyone will be very fat from the starchy diet..
In the future everyone will be very thin from not having enough to eat..
In the future it will be next to impossible to tell girls from boys, even in bed.
In the future men will be "super-masculine" and women will be "ultra-feminine."
In the future half of us will be "mentally ill."
In the future there will be no religion or spiritualism of any sort.
In the future the "psychic arts" will be put to practical use.
In the future we will not think that "nature" is beautiful.
In the future the weather will always be the same.
In the future no one will fight with anyone else.
In the future there will be an atomic war.
In the future water will be expensive.
In the future all material items will be free.
In the future everyone's house will be like a little fortress.
In the future everyone's house will be a total entertainment center.
In the future everyone but the wealthy will be very happy.
In the future everyone but the wealthy will be very filthy.
In the future everyone but the wealthy will be very healthy.
In the future TV will be so good that the printed word will function as an art form only.
In the future people with boring jobs will take pills to relieve the boredom.
In the future no one will live in cities
In the future there will be mini-wars going on everywhere.
In the future everyone will think about love all the time.
In the future political and other decisions will be based completely on opinion polls.
In the future there will be machines which will produce a religious experience in the user.
In the future there will be groups of wild people, living in the wilderness.
In the future there will be only paper money, which will be personalized.
In the future there will be a classless society.
In the future everyone will only get to go home once a year.
In the future everyone will stay home all the time.
In the future we will not have time for leisure activities.
In the future we will only "work" one day a week.
In the future our bodies will be shriveled up but our brains will be bigger.
In the future there will be starving people everywhere.
In the future people will live in space.
In the future no one will be able to afford TV.
In the future the helpless will be killed.
In the future everyone will have their own style of way-out clothes.
In the future we will make love to anything anytime anywhere.
In the future there will be so much going on that no one will be able to keep track of it

Can A 'Possum Be Cute and Charming?

Before seeing this one, I almost certainly would have said "no." I have dealt with the critters up close and personal several times. Fascinating, yes. Worthy of respect, absolutely. Even scary in close quarters. Perhaps the issue here is that none of the pictures show Heidi baring her teeth: the armaments found in possums' mouths are fearsome. But I have to say, this one just makes me want to cuddle her. The Germans agree, and the article in Der Spiegel says,

A new addition to the Leipzig Zoo has yet to be seen by the public, but that hasn't stopped her from becoming a star. Heidi, a young cross-eyed opossum, is shaping up to be the most popular furry critter in Germany since Knut the celebrity polar bear.

Awww, what a sweetheart.

Thursday, January 6, 2011

Thorsday: Sleipnir

Sleipnir was Odin's eight-legged horse; above, "Odin riding Sleipnir," from an 18th century Icelandic manuscript, currently in the possession of The Danish Royal Library. Image from Wikipedia.

Wednesday, January 5, 2011

Another Riveting Paleontology Documentary

(Savage Chickens) Dinosaurs are cool, don't get me wrong. And I almost never watch television, so honestly, I don't know if this has even been done (Though I do know BBC did First Life, I don't know if it has aired in the US... well, okay, according to Wikipedia, it has.) But the fact that some extinct animal, or plant, for that matter, isn't a dinosaur, isn't gigantic, and isn't (gasp!) even a vertebrate doesn't mean it's dull. So while I enjoy the above comic, I sort of resent the attitude that spawned it. (This shouldn't be taken as a criticism of Doug Savage, the artist, but rather of broad attitudes in our society.)

This Made Me Laugh

Titanic Reenactment Club Loses Another 1,300 Members

Doyle Redland reports here, but the headline alone fetched a good guffaw from me.

Wednesday Wednesday

By Horror Move at Deviant Art

Punny Nose

Every now and then, my nose taps into quantities of... fluid... that are unimaginably enormous. I swear, I don't consume enough liquids and solids to account for the quantities of... stuff... that pour from my face. Seriously, it feels like a contradiction of the conservation of mass. I don't feel sick; I suspect it's just allergies. Still, when the constant wiping has worn the skin to the point it's starting to feel scabby, I'm just miserable. This has been going on since New Year's eve, and it is, at this point, officially old. I still try to find some humor in it; that's just my way of dealing with things that annoy me. Without further ado, here are some of my favorite comments about this frakking Oceanus Nasalus:

Old Faceful is in full eruptive mode;
It's the Energizer Runny: it just keeps going, and going, and going;
It may look like water, but it'snot.

It's been clear and cold since last Wedneday, but today we're having a light drizzle. I'm hoping that whatever is in the air gets washed out. My face hurts.

Titillating Trivia

The likeness of which Playboy playmate has been to the Lunar surface? Answer here, and if it's your kind of thing, it's up for auction, along with quite a bit of other spacey memorabilia.

Items can currently be previewed on the Company's main site. Bidding runs from January 13-20.

Followup: According to IO9, it didn't actually go to the lunar surface; it was stashed in the command module.

Tuesday, January 4, 2011

Tuesday Tits

White-shouldered Black Tit (Parus guineensis), from The Internet Bird Collection.

Twins Born in Different Years

What with dead birds, dead fish, and more dead birds, 2011 doesn't appear to be off to an auspicious start. But I found this amusing: a pair of twins were delivered near Chicago by Caesarian section, one in the last minute of 2010, the other in the first minute of 2011.

The twins' father, Brandon Lewis, said one of the doctors was counting the minutes down before the births, adding that it was "definitely the best" new year's countdown he had ever experienced.