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http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/ICanHasCh http://icanhascheezburger.com/?p=164399
Bugsy’s philosophy was simple: sometimes the crime is worth the time. maek sur u dont git identified at teh lineup. Picture by: dunno source. Caption by: Winnie-Wonka via Advanced Lol Builder       | ||||||
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July 4th, 2009
July 4th, 2009
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| 147 years ago today, Alice in Wonderland was published, 86 years after the American Declaration of Independence. Those lawyers, merchants and farmers dropped through a hole in the world to an upside down place with no kings, where speech was free and faith second to thought, except in truths self-evident. It's a testament to their ideals and foresight that this document still stands today. | ||||||
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July 5th, 2009
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This afternoon we had a small board gaming session. DaveL came over and together with ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} lulucthulhu and threetrees, I got three games out on the table.The first was an old favourite to get us into the mood. It is a while since we played Red Empire and I had intended to showcase the game at Games Expo, but did not manage to get it out of the bag. So we played a lot of Pandemic instead. We were quickly into the swing of things, with only two changes of presidency (between me and DaveL), and we managed to deal with all but one of the Crisis, ending the game by exhausting the deck. We got in a little table talk too. I managed to win 65 points to 49! At DaveL’s suggestion we introduced threetrees to Pandemic. We set the game at medium level, so had plenty of Epidemic cards to deal with, and we had the Medic role (threetrees took this role, as it is the easiest to play), so it was slightly easier. We got threatened with Outbreaks several times – we only got as far as four, but the number of cards we had to draw each turn went up to four too! We had the Researcher and Scientist too, as well as the Dispatcher, so I got to move everyone around. We won, but it was a close run thing, the draw deck not quite exhausted.We ended the session with a new game, Days of Steam, a game that I picked up at Games Expo. This is a train game, but a relatively easy one. It involves you laying tracks and towns, collecting the goods from each town and delivering them elsewhere. The game has a nice balance between the need to lay track and the need to build up steam to drive the trains so that goods can be delivered. The game plays well and looks very nice, although the rulebook does need a polish. | ||||
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July 4th, 2009
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| For the Ficlette Fiasco IV, still plugging away. This is for sparrowwritings: Dawning Light: Supernatural. More Mini!Dawn with Sam and Dean. Prompt: the colour pink and metallica. Setting: Middle of season three, before Dean ( spoiler ). Nothing beyond that into season four. Rating: PG for Dean's language Follow-up to Fire in the Fields ( ''We should have left her with Bobby.'' ) | ||||||||||
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tiredJuly 4th, 2009
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http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/ICanHasCh http://icanhascheezburger.com/?p=164393
7 out ov 7 kittehs hab no intenshun ov racing aniwhear i fink dis kitteh gotz u beet. Picture by: Suzu88. Caption by: Debeh via Advanced Lol Builder       | ||||||
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July 4th, 2009
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| Listening to Steve Earle's tribute album. It is very very indeed. Earle makes the songs his own while staying true to the spirit of the originals. I'd love to hear these live in an intimate setting, like, say, the Bluebird Cafe. | ||||||||||
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enthralledJuly 4th, 2009
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| Footprints on a black sand beach. Kalapana, Hawaii June 2009 | ||||||
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July 4th, 2009
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| Every so often, I'll post an abbreviated menu to Facebook, usually while in a state of self-satisfied repletion. But this recipe is what it says up there on the tin. In honor of picnics in honor of the Fourth, here's the best deviled egg recipe I've ever made, by far: DEVA'D EGGS 12 eggs, hard-boiled, halved, yolks separated 6 TBSP mayonnaise 1 1/2 TSP curry powder (we're dangerously low on Penzey's Maharajah blend, and I may have to devote an afternoon to cloning it. Or break down and buy another jar) 3/4 TSP garlic paste 1/3 TSP celery salt 1/2 TSP salt (or more to taste) 1/4 TSP fresh ground black pepper (or more to taste) 1/2 TSP lemon juice (or more to taste) Dump your yolks in a big glass bowl, and mix in the next four ingredients. Then comes the slightly tricky bit with the salt and pepper -- don't over-salt the things; over-peppering them is more forgivable because the curry powder will give you some breathing room there. Once you've got the saltiness where you want it (or just a little below that, ideally), add lemon juice to brighten the flavor -- there will be a kind of hole in the top notes that slowly adding lemon juice will fill. If you over-lemon it, you can add another TSP or so of mayo to smooth it back out in the middle register. Then take your little spoon and moosh the filling back into the hard-boiled whites, making sure to accidentally split one or three of them so that you have to eat the failures. (I usually have mollpeartree do this part -- only the willpower of someone who's quit smoking is up to the task of filling deviled eggs. If it were me doing it, this dozen egg recipe would result in about five eggs left over for company.)One could, I suspect, make a slightly lighter version of this with olive oil in for the mayo, though you'd want to cut the amount by half or more, and you'd risk making it too sweet -- maybe some chili pepper would cut through that, but by now, you're talking about a whole different recipe, really. So I'd just stick with the mayo, myself. | ||||||||
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July 4th, 2009
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| A new record kayaking for me today: 7.5 miles (or a little over 12 kilometers) in 2.5 hours. Wah-HOOOOOO! To be fair, I did it in a Necky Manitou 14. While not as slick as the Wilderness Systems Zephyr 155, it's a peppy little boat with a similar design. The main difference is that the Necky Manitou 14 is a light touring kayak (suitable for rivers, lakes, protected harbors), while the Zephyr is classified as a touring kayak (rivers, lakes, protected harbors, and open ocean). In either case, I'm insufferably pleased with myself. *does happy dance* Now, I must get back to whacking at my Remix while repeating the following mantra to myself: "I'm writing this story as if I was the one who wrote it. I'm writing this story as if I was the one who wrote it..." All the main points of the original is there, but I've significantly telescoped the timeline, expanded on the actions taken by the various characters, and added additional characters into the mix. In short, to borrow the example from musesfool, I'm doing the Disney version of "The Little Mermaid" vs. the original's Hans Christian Andersen version of "The Little Mermaid". It'll be interesting to see the reaction.Now, I must get back to writing, otherwise there's no way I'm going to make deadline. | ||||||||
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accomplishedJuly 4th, 2009
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| Lava pebble on a black sand beach. Kalapana, Hawaii June 2009 | ||||||
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July 4th, 2009
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| Drove over to Bolsover to visit Mum. Bill drove us to Mansfield (flatter and fewer cobbles for her wheelchair) and we Did Shopping. Helped by the sweet lass in Bon Mache giving Mum a 40% off voucher, she bought many summer clothes. I bought two jackets, black and blue, from Anne Harvey, reduced from £65 each to £15. Blue one is viscose and black a linen/cotton mix, reserved enough for work, casual enough to make me happy. We stopped for coffee. We are, I should point out, in a coffee shop in the middle of a city. So in comes a dragonfly. From where, I know not, no ponds or gardens for miles. And then the screaming starts, staff and patrons act as though a rat had just come in. It's a dragonfly, for heavens sake, what's it going to do? Mug them? So, armed with a large glass (glass is so I don't damage it) I attempted a rescue, this involved climbing over chairs and in the window. Except the buggering thing had a wing span greater than the pint glass. Got it in, sideways, eventually, released outside, probably to a sad end. If I'd had some way to carry it, I'd have released it where it had a small chance of surviving, such as Bill's pond. But I was pushing a wheelchair, laden with bags and a Dorothy. Oh well, at least it had a small chance. I couldn't believe how hysterical the coffee shop staff were. Yes, it was a large dragonfly, but they are harmless, beautiful things. Highly unusual to see one in such an urban setting but for heavens sake, it was a dragonfly! FF | ||||||
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July 4th, 2009
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| jholloway asked me to take some photos of his miniatures. It was a bit tricky as the best place to do it was outside and it was very windy and the trees wouldn't stay upright. The building scene was taken on the flagstones which worked OK for the main shot but there isn't enough detail for the crops. Stupidly, I didn't think of taking some detail shots with the macro lens I had used for the bronze statue. I blame the heat for turning my brain into slush... The tight crops would have been much better as full macro shots but I had no way of elevating the scene so I could use the tripod and the macro lens. Handheld macros are tricky as well. Oh for a decent space with a table and enough room around it to set up lights (or a nice big window beside it)... | ||||||||||
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okay
July 4th, 2009
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http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/ICanHasCh http://icanhascheezburger.com/?p=162601
MOVES he’s got them pikkin up teh chix. ur doin it rite. Picture by: dunno source. Caption by: Likalooce via Poster Builder       | ||||||
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July 4th, 2009
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 Many years, there is one book on the Clarke Award shortlist that the author probably doesn't think is science fiction, or at least not sf in the sense commonly understood by the so-called literary establishment. If there's any justice, I'd like to see Turbulence be that book next year. It is as much sf as Neal Stephenson's Cryptonomicon, a book it very much resembles in subject if not style. Both books feature rather geeky protagonists drawn by the Second World War into a situation where their hitherto abstract field of research has suddenly assumed deadly importance. Rather than code-breaking, Foden concentrates on meteorology, and in particular the need for the Allied command to forecast the weather in the run up to D-Day. Accurate forecasting is bedevilled, however, by its inability to cope with the chaotic effects of turbulence, and a young Henry Meadows is sent to Scotland to try to extract hints from the one man believed to have meaningful insight in the area. But Wallace Ryman - an incredibly thinly-disguised Lewis Fry Richardson - is a devout Quaker unwilling to countenance any application of his theories to war; indeed, he is far more interested in trying to model and understand the statistical dynamics of war itself.Turbulence is superbly written, and Meadows is well drawn as a character whose intellect is let down by his immaturity. If it has faults, they lie in the plotting. The book seems to finish rather abruptly; one feels that having reached the point he wanted to, Foden felt obliged to wrap up with almost indecent speed. And the framing story, featuring a much older Meadows, is rather odd - without giving too much away, it seems to be set in an early 1980s that featured one rather spectacular project that never happened in our timeline. Mind you, that's another reason to consider Turbulence as sf. My prediction: expect to see a somewhat Merchant Ivory style film, dropping the framing story, upping the love interest, and emphasising grim wartime London and idyllic Scottish Highlands. | ||||||||
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July 4th, 2009
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| Asked in email: Is there a summary of all the reasons why O'Neill colonies wouldn't work? | ||||||
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July 4th, 2009
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I was going to post something sarcastic when I learned that Hollywood is working on a movie based on the arcade game Asteroids, but it seems Io9 beat me to it. So did the New York Times. So did everybody, really. Quoting Io9: Anyone who is a fan of classic video games knows the familiar story behind Asteroids . . . which is that you are a triangle, and you are shooting a series of geometric shapes. Released in 1979, the game is a perfect example of extremely early and crude computer graphics. And seriously, there was no effort made whatsoever to have a story. Why were you shooting the asteroids? Were they controlled by aliens? Were you trying to break them up so you could mine them for nickel in their cores? It was all an 8-bit mystery. Here's a brief history of the game. | ||||||
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July 4th, 2009
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http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/ICanHasCh http://icanhascheezburger.com/?p=164421
Human.. I am ready for my walk. Picture by: dunno source. Caption by: dunno source via Our LOL Builder       | ||||||
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July 4th, 2009
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| Which editor would it be funniest to see inundated by a flood of stories featuring cat-girls? | ||||||
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July 4th, 2009
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| Chris' Invincible Super-Blog reviews Tarot #42 (possibly NSFW) | ||||||
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July 4th, 2009
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| The second RPG I tried at Games Expo was the (now) Origins Award winning Mouse Guard. This was first thing Saturday morning, with DaveL and I rushing to get there, and not be distracted by everything that was new and on sale! We did not even have time to visit the face painter and get our faces done as mice. Which would have been very silly, but funny all the same. We had a group of six and were playing the “Deliver the Mail” scenario from the core book. I only know this now because I am currently reading the core book. I also know that we were not playing the game as written, there being no adversarial division in the game between the GM and the players. So instead of the GM’s and the players’ turns, the game was played more as a traditional RPG. One very nice touch was that the GM has finger puppets for each character, complete with the right colour cloak and weapon. This was because Mouse Guard is regarded as an introductory game – it is and it isn’t, being slightly too complex for that, but in the hands of a good GM it is – and while we did not use them as finger puppets, we did use them as miniatures. Although a comment was made that we could play the game in one-to-one scale right there on the table, mice not being all that big. Despite not adhering to the turn structure we all had fun. I kept arguing that we needed to deal with problems that were coming up before rushing off to deliver the mail, and that actually developed into an argument. I lost. In the end though, I was proved right. We had to go back and deal with a major threat to one village. What was interesting was our having to adjust to thinking down to mouse scale. Nature became much, much more of a threat. We were all very brave and clever where it was needed! I attacked a ground squirrel and stuck it with an arrow before DaveL dived in and drove the arrow into the creature’s skull with his spear. I gave him the name “Nosestriker” for that! Lastly I defended us against a snake by striking it from the inside! I had to be cut out and I was battered and bruised. It was a fun game and I do hope that DaveL runs it. I just hope that dinkybruiser will like it. | ||||
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July 4th, 2009
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| ( You are about to view content that may not be appropriate for minors. ) | ||||||||
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July 4th, 2009
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http://www.badscience.net/2009/07/asking-f There’s nothing like science for giving that objective, white-coat flavoured legitimacy to your prejudices, so it must have been a great day for Telegraph readers when they came across the headline “Women who dress provocatively more likely to be raped, claim scientists”. Ah, scientists. “Women who drink alcohol, [...] | ||||||
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July 4th, 2009
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| This is traditional. Happy birthday tax-dodging, religion dissenting... REBEL SCUM! | ||||
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July 4th, 2009
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| If you are going to say happy birthday America, say it with fireworks. North Korea did. Which was nice. | ||||
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July 4th, 2009
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| So Sarah Palin, Governor of Alaska is going to step down and not run again.lulucthulhu has been wondering if her next career move will be as a Tina Fey impersonator? | ||||
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July 4th, 2009
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| We were taught a lot about how to eat and drink properly during the Customs, Etiquette and Social Responsibilities module of RAF Officer Training at Cranwell, but not this: (alt link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M8RF Actually, we were warned not to use the RAF Officers' Sword (which is in fact a cavalry sabre) to cut the wedding cake, as it's meant to be corrosive to the blade. Seeing as how hardly any of us owned swords - which cost £2,000 from Wilkinson's - but rather borrowed them from a pool, I can understand why we were advised to take good care of them. | ||||||
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July 4th, 2009
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http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/ICanHasCh http://icanhascheezburger.com/?p=162270
See? Ders bibul abowt kittehs. We is gods. Picture by: dunno source. Caption by: outofkittehs via Our LOL Builder       | ||||||
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July 4th, 2009
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http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/2351.ht  | ||||||
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July 4th, 2009
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http://journal.neilgaiman.com/2009/07/de posted by Neil
I went to Los Angeles, had a sort of a working holiday, came home, and am writing. Working out a lot with the trainer, got a new trampoline. The cherry tree is covered in cherries, and the wild raspberries (red and black) are out in the woods, and I find them when I walk the dog. Nights here are filled with fireflies. Steve Brust came over for dinner tonight and brought his puppy, and we talked about stories and writing until late. It's a good world. That's about it for excitement at this end. Lots of people have written in asking stuff about me and Amanda, and I don't really know how to answer them. Either they're really nice and pleased for us and encouraging and don't need answering, or they're the kind of things that leave me deeply puzzled, and to which the only responses are "Isn't that a bit personal?" or "Probably none of your business I'm afraid," or even "Why would you write things like that?" Hello Neil, Why don't you blog more often? Just a death wish I guess. Your blog is a wonderful thing to read. I have a rare case of skin cancer and your blog cheer me up! Mostly because I have less to say right now, I think. Or at least, I hate repeating myself. The blog's eight years old, and over one million three hundred thousand words long. That's a lot of blogging: a lot of ideas, a lot of words, a lot of answers. People write to me with questions still, but much of the time they're questions that have already been answered on the blog, usually at some length -- the kind of things that make me think that I should spend the time I could spend writing again (say) how you get an agent into, instead, organising things and getting a really useful FAQ up and running, or just a way of finding things, particularly advice on writing. Obviously, I'm sorry you have a rare case of skin cancer, and I would be just as sorry if it was a common sort of skin cancer. So here, to cheer you up and fulfill your dying wish: a blog, and a link to an interview http://www.wmagazine.com/w/blogs/editors Todd Klein, letterer extraordinaire has the fourth in his series of prints out. The art is by J. H. Williams III, and you can see it here. Back in November I was interviewed by Chip Kidd at the 92nd St Y. (I talked about it on the blog at the time.) The whole talk, with Karen Berger's introduction and all, is up now on YouTube, and is embedded here for your pleasure. It's an hour and a half. And finally, there are now more than 666,666 people following me on Twitter. So we had a party. It's still ongoing, the party, over at http://bit.ly/666party and to join in all you have to do is upload a photgraph of you and a Balloon. And once 600 people showed up at the party, the webgoblin made this: a mosaic. Edit to add, and here's a wonderful click to zoom in, shift-click to zoom out version at http://www.uslot.com/neilballoons/  | ||||||
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July 4th, 2009
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http://www.giveawayoftheday.com/winx-vid http://www.giveawayoftheday.com/?p=7620
With WinX DVD Ripper, you are able to enjoy stylish DVD movies on your portable devices. It allows you to modify video and audio parameters, clip segment you favored, add and move subtitles, as well as customize video file size and son on. This DVD ripper is also designed with user friendly interface. Both new and inexperience users can easily rip DVD in few clicks. Furthermore, it applies high efficiency on ripping speed, so you can rip DVD at high speed without any quality loss. | ||||||
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WinX DVD Ripper is powerful and all-in-one DVD ripping software, it helps you convert and rip DVD to MP4, DivX, AVI, MOV (QuickTime), MPEG, VOB, FLV (Flash Video), WMV, ASF video file formats, and extract audio to MP3 format.
May Contain Nuts...
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