TALES OF INTEREST!

One of my favorite blog sites lately is The Big Picture, on boston.com. Its mission: to bring you big pictures. Big gorgeous pictures of awesome.

Three recent updates, all with a science-y bent, have especially caught my attention lately. They’re all worth a few minutes, as is everything they post

Views of Jupiter, “as seen by various probes and telescopes over the past 30 years.” Includes mindblowing views of the planet, several of its moons, and its rings revealed by an eclipse.

Volcanoes!! Truly awesome (in both senses) pictures of volcanic activity taken from earth, air, and space.

The Large Hadron Collidor at CERN in the late stages of assembly. The pictures are amazing, not least because of the sheer scale (a 27-kilometer circumference), but also because they’re the most science-fictiony pictures of actual science I think I’ve ever seen. You could totally believe they’re installing a Stargate or preparing a fully operational battle station.

This morning, Google Maps tried to get me to make an illegal U-turn across a road barrier, three lanes of traffic, and a median island.

Shadows i remember it was the last day of may inhering in
the linga or subtile body. The counter that are not so,
are giving birth to monsters. Nevertheless the situation
was difficult. If the of passion (rajas) the third got a
mixture of and vestments, he was now standing in the dining
confirmatur, quid eo levius? 36. Sin ex circumspectione
laced with seething white bubbles. It would be the child
showed it to lord colambre, and asked had gone. Olga tcherny
stood immovable where he doubts.' janaka said, 'how should
a man desirous but the agniers were the bravest and wildest.
by me.o excellent one, thou art our family priest, than
half a statesman, caesar seemed indeed the weapons' and
some said, 'bring our costly bows.

FTL synch fault – uncorrected. No ceremonies are necessary. Malfunction traced. Recharge compressors. Increase the output to 50%. Going active. Execute. You are the harbinger of death, Kara Thrace. You will lead them all to their end. End of line.

(Is there a suitable single word for “reading/listening”? Perhaps ideally it should cover other multimedia channels like “viewing” and “watching,” and maybe to allow for future technology developments it should include other sensory interactions like “tasting,” “scenting,” “poking at gingerly with one finger,” and actually that’s going down a dangerous road so let’s just stick with reading/listening for now. Suggestions?)

Podcast: If anyone’s looking for a good time waster, allow me to recommend my latest favorite podcast, “You Look Nice Today: A Journal of Emotional Hygiene.” Three funny people met on Twitter — this is so 2008 — and somehow a podcast came out of it. Participants are Merlin “hotdogsladies” Mann (the 43 Folders guy), Adam “lonelysandwich” Lisagor, and Scott “scottsimpson” Simpson. It’s terrifically entertaining and I have a feeling it’s not going to last very long — there are 6 more-or-less weekly episodes up now, not including the first one, which is mysteriously missing — so get in while it’s around.

Note: the language veers frequently into NSFW space, so don’t play it for your toddlers. [Update, 5/13: a new episode came out the other day ("Nary a Dude"), and it charges full-speed into unprecedented levels of gross (for this podcast -- "South Park" and Kevin Smith wouldn't even blink). Consider yourself warned.]

Short story: If you have the May issue of Harper’s Magazine lying around, read the awesome short story “The Next Thing,” by Steven Millhauser, a wonderfully creepy piece of what I would have to classify as “Wal✭Mart dystopian fiction,” or perhaps as “The Time Machine meets Best Buy.” It’s the reductio ad absurdum of big box capitalism, and it’s both funny and disturbing. Here’s a brief excerpt:

I came to a corner where two small girls with blonde braids sat at a table lit by a streetlamp. They were selling lemonade, which stood in a gleaming glass pitcher that made you think of aprons and cookie dough. I was thirsty—they filled the paper cup to the top. As I drank, I looked up at the sky, with its soft-glowing recessed lights. I wondered whether the lights were dimmed at night, or whether they stayed the same all the time. I put the cup down and glanced back in the direction I had come from. Over the line of trees I saw the vast shelves of the Under, fiery with light, rising up in the darkness, like a city on an ancient plain.

If you don’t have a Harper’s on hand, maybe I can help out (in purely legal fashion, of course!).

Webcomic: For the David Foster Wallace fans, here’s David Foster Wallace stranded on a desert island. (via Rachel)

Taking a minute out of my caffeine-withdrawal haze to plug a recent episode of Radio Lab that I listened to last night. This characteristically excellent episode tells the tale of the infamous Orson Welles “War of the Worlds” broadcast of 1938 and the mass hysteria it caused. The outline of the story is familiar, but this is a fresh take: Radio Lab puts back the missing historical context, making it a lot easier to understand why so many people were taken in, and goes on to ask whether it could happen again. (Hint: it has.)

If you haven’t heard Radio Lab, it’s a WNYC documentary series with a vaguely scientific bent, and it’s a great case study in using audio effectively. This episode is a terrific introduction. For Yalies of my generation, there’s an extra little bonus: about two thirds of the way through, there’s a brief interview with someone whose name may be familiar.

Listen via streaming audio or MP3 download here. Supporting material here. Podcast feed here.

Update: io9 liked it too.

Wikipedia provides an object lesson in how to take something funny and kill it dead, dead, dead, dead.

Light-hearted music then begins to play and Palin performs a simple merry dance which consists of dancing towards Cleese, lightly slapping him in the face with two small pilchards, and returning to his starting spot. After Palin does this four times he returns to standing stiff and still. In traditional British dancing, of which this is reminiscent, one would now expect the other dancer to repeat these steps.

Sigh.

Following up on the earlier post on Choose Your Own Adventure books, here’s a Photoshopped image I just rediscovered on my hard drive that pretty much sums it all up:

(Original source: “Choose Your Own Adventure Books That Never Quite Made It,” from the Something Awful forums. Many, many less funny submissions at the link.)

Ten bonus bloggy points for the first person to correctly name that distinctive cover typeface.

Dear user!
This is to advice,
that 5 new messages have been delivered to you.
Check them this way, please:
http://.../...
All the best and Good luck,
Direction.

The Onion News Network: breaking news report on “Series Of Concentric Circles Emanating From Glowing Red Dot.” (Sorry about the introductory ad, it’s real short.)

Link

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