The ravaging of the nerds

This is hilarious and beautiful. I cried.



Via Videogum

Seed bombs

I'm posting these photos to show you I would like to write in this blog more, but I can't, because I am doing other things. Like organizing seed bomb workshops.




You can read more about it on the Garden Posse blog.

I only have time to tell you these things about some music I listen to:

1. This band from Houston, the Wild Moccasins, have been playing in my head for the past week. They played (outside my brain) at Marshall's last show. Then they slept over at his house and appeared in the morning like high schoolers at an awkward boy-girl slumber party. They are tiny and twee and goddamn catchy.
2. I bought Juana Molina, Un Dia, yesterday, and am very glad I did. It's beautiful.
3. I'm going to see The Morning Benders at Stubb's tomorrow night. I'm taking my Posse.

Here he is

Things on my mind in 2009

1. Obama. is. president.

2. Being guardedly hopeful and generally happy

3. Population ("are we screwed?")

4. My Studio 360 piece about an amateur fossil hunter and intelligent design versus evolution and how I need to get cracking on that

5. Integrating video into radio and if video could kill the radio star all over again, or it might just be really frustrating

6. Arranging a seed bomb making workshop for the Garden Posse

7. SKIING!!!!!!!!! I MIGHT GO SKIING THIS YEAR!!! OH MY GOD

8. How people think I'm maybe 16 or 17 years old and whether or not I need a makeover, and if so, how would I do that without reality TV or Oprah.

9. I really like O magazine.

Possible expansion upon one or more of these subjects may or may not be upcoming.

Baby Alive is reALIVE

One Christmas, when I was about 7 or so, Baby Alive was on top of my Christmas wish list. Baby Alive was a doll that you could feed and then it would pee and poop. You looked in its diaper to find out which surprise Baby Alive had left you. Somehow this appealed to me, and I wanted Baby Alive more than anything else that year.

Much to the chagrin of my parents, Santa brought her to me. However, I quickly lost interest when I anxiously searched for realistic urine and feces in the doll's diaper and found only the water and yellow goo I had fed her only moments before. ("What? No poop?!") I think that's when I learned an important lesson about human anatomy. Also, Baby Alive smelled like plastic. She was really disappointing.

For some reason, Hasbro brought back the pissing and shitting doll for this past Christmas. In retrospect, I don't think Baby Alive is such a great product. Originally debuted in 1973, they seem to bring it back each generation, for a new group of parents to be disgusted anew, and for their innocent girls to demand it from them.

As one of those girls, I feel for the recipients of this year's Baby Alive scheme. Even though the 2008 model comes with ethnic options and green beans, they will inevitably be failed by the doll's lack of an intestinal and rectal system. If a girl unwrapped Baby Alive for Christmas, by this time, or perhaps in a few days, the gift will be abandoned. However, the girl will be endlessly amused by the word "poop" for many, many years.

On an unrelated note: Last night, in a random search, I learned there's a band named Poop. Listen on Last.fm!

Who is: the Smoke Duke of Durham?

My new love: NYPL Digital Gallery

He is a nobleman who knows that mannish children love tobacco; not candy, cakes, or pie.

My common cold

I've had a bad cold this week. Tuesday was the first day of my (still short) professional working career that I've ever called in sick. I laid in bed and finally gave in to watching Sex & the City: the movie. It was even more vapid and materialistic than I thought it would be. I couldn't help but wonder, Carrie Bradshaw-style, could this movie have been released after we've declared a recession and articles are citing cutbacks at luxury labels? Maybe men are like bound-to-be-outdated movies, after all.

Anyhow. The cold hit my office pretty hard. Today, my first full day back (between going home early, staying home late, and taking a disorienting nap in the Relaxation Room aka quiet room with a couch), I found this article:

Hot Drinks Help Fight Cold and Flu

The research was done by Cardiff University's Centre for the Common Cold.

Published in the December 2008 edition of the clinical journal Rhinology, the research compared the effects of a commercially produced cordial apple and blackcurrant drink either 'hot' or at room temperature in 30 volunteers with common cold symptoms.

The Centre's Director, Professor Ron Eccles, is urging people suffering from colds or flu to have a hot drink to help reduce their symptoms.

Professor Eccles said: "It is surprising that this is the first scientific research on the benefit of a hot drink for treating cold and flu symptoms."

Seriously? A whole center focused on the common cold and this is all they've come up with? Hey, Professor Eccles, maybe there's been no scientific research because benefits of hot drink seemed like common sense?

I'm drinking some Lemon Lift right now, and I got started on it before I even saw the scientific proof that it might make me feel better. Sadly, I've also seen scientific papers saying that homemade chicken soup is indeed good for your cold (and the soul) because it's made with love. Science said that. My mom, on her frequent calls to check in, kept telling me she wished she could make me some chicken soup. "I feel like I'm in second grade," I told her.

As a mark of my growing up, my boyfriend brought me carrot ginger soup instead, because I said no chunks and he really likes carrots. My contribution to the meal was to be some toasted French bread - until I noticed smoke emanating from toaster and my toast seriously on fire. It was a two alarm toaster oven fire. Having spent all afternoon unable to get out of bed, I got an adrenaline surge which allowed me to jump up and down and yell, "Marshall! My toast is on fire!"

He ran to my aid and demanded a fire extinguisher. I got it out from under the sink and handed it to him. Then he stood trying to figure out how to work the thing while the toast continued to flame. "Marshall, decisive action!" I yelled, cowering behind him. I've seen many a cockroach scurry away while he considers what to do with his shoe and I hide under a blanket.

Eventually the toast burned down, due to lack of oxygen in the toaster, and then Marshall blew it out. The toast looked like it had burned through a few layers of bread epidermis. We had survived.

The circle is complete

I am, right now, eating a child's Halloween candy. The child, and the candy, belong to a coworker. As I picked through the five pound plastic bag of unwanted Whoppers, M&Ms, mini Tootsie Roll Pops, and High School Musical 3 milk chocolate flavored Strawberry Rockin Pop (artificially and confoundedly flavored) candy for a 3 Musketeers bar, an early and traumatic experience came to mind. My parents taking my pillowcase full of Halloween candy by force, to the office.

"Adults don't like candy!" I protested, gripping the bag into my body.

It was useless (and untrue). All my hard-earned, delicious loot went to the bland, tasteless place called "the office," realm of adults who don't earn candy for themselves, and don't appreciate it.

Years later, that candy has returned to me, in the office. And it's true, I don't appreciate it as much. But I still feel the sting of my candy being forcibly taken.

I told this to my boss. She said, "Oh, she [co-worker's daughter] doesn't care, she probably doesn't even want it."

"That's what my parents probably told their co-workers," I said. I felt eerie.

Guess who hop

Guess Who from Kirsten Lepore on Vimeo.

I guess there's just something about hip-hop remixed with childhood nostalgia and brilliance.

Also from the same filmmaker is the sweetest story ever told by food... and the hottest cupcake/gourd sex scene on film. Seriously, watch it.


"Sweet Dreams" (2007) from Kirsten Lepore on Vimeo.

So cuddly, yet so lonely

Hipster Runoff named this, "The Electroest Couple Alive."

I don't think this couple has good communication in their relationship. She looks utterly indifferent to anything but bright colors and whiskey, and he has clothed himself in comfort objects, eyes pleading to the camera, "When will I have the love I deserve?"

This must symbolize the erosion of the human interface platform by different types of media.

That's okay. Because I think all I really need is Dinosaur Comics. I'll see you there, after I get back from human interfacing in Denver this weekend.

Childhood reading

I loved the Redwall books when I was a kid.

This reminded me of my favorite warrior mouse in literature. I think my brother and I named our hamster after another Redwall character, Mariel. Mariel drowned in the basement. I was blamed for allowing her to escape from her cage. I still feel guilty. (If it had been a dog it wouldn't have happened, why couldn't we ever have a dog?)

Now I'm reading If on a winter's night a traveler, by Italo Calvino. I like it quite a lot.

Commons love

Bookplate from the Brooklyn Museum

I'm still in love with Flickr Commons.

I'm still loving Michelle Obama.

I also love winter squash and summer squash and nice earrings.

OBAMA!

This morning, I did not wake up to feelings of anxiety and disappointment. A turning point in my political life - measured optimism for the presidency. Obama won!

I watched the election at a friend's house. He brought his big flat-screen TV outside and had a keg and set up lawn chairs. It was like tailgating the election. I got a mosquito bite on my forehead. We watched the coverage on Comedy Central with Stewart & Colbert when the flashy, confusing graphics and over-the-top maps on cable news got to be too much. It was comedy. So when Jon Stewart called it for Obama, after the West Coast came in, no one quite believed him. We all looked at each other. Is this for real? we asked ourselves. It was only 10pm (CT)! Was it really over? I mean, it's a national election and voting is a messy process. The American people have to have a contested state, a recall, or at least some chads hanging around. We need that.

But holy cow, it was true. McCain gave a very gracious speech, then flip to Chicago, where I had seen the tents set up this weekend, on the way to the Field Museum. The political commentators back on MSNBC pointed out that there were black people in the crowd. And the nation suddenly got a lot more diverse.

I think it only hit me when Obama walked out with his family. Because, gosh darn it, I love Michelle Obama. She is so awesome. I feel giddy when I imagine her in the White House. No, seriously, could she be more awesome? I don't know! I feel like she could! And that would be more awesome!


I'm just really, really happy that there will be a smart, strong woman in the White House to be a visible role model. I mean, think. Michelle Obama in the White House..... Cindy McCain in the White House.... big difference. What Barack Obama will be able to do as president versus what John McCain would have done as president? Not so clear.

Pictures of real dead things

This weekend I went on a whirlwind trip to Chicago, the great city of the Midwest. We spent most of our time with Marshall's family, and I got to tell my "babykilling ant nanny" story a bunch of times. People love that one, and it makes me seem interesting.

The one thing I can say I saw in Chicago was the Field Museum. I'd been to the Field Museum a couple of years ago, when I drove cross-country to school. I was super psyched at the prospect of seeing Sue again.

Sue gets invited to more black-tie museum benefits in death than in life (scientists believe). That night, she would be attending a gala for excellence in Illinois masonry.

The Field Museum has a lot of stuffed animals. These furry rodents were involved in mortal combat - wait! It's too late! They're already dead! And one is forever placed in an indecent, and unflattering position!

Dead things can also be aesthetically pleasing.

Marshall eats the last of the passenger pigeons.

We spent a lot of time in the Natural Disasters exhibit. It's pretty awesome of how museums have become so much more than, as Marshall put it, "putting some shit in a box." We jumped up and down to measure our seismic impact! We created our own volcanoes and watched them grow and explode! We stood in the middle of a tornado! Like the real thing, but on screens, in a museum, and not dangerous. The only thing the exhibit was lacking was a taxidermized critter or two. Gotta have it.

Le chat

Your love hurts - the planet and everything on it

So says Slate, making "The environmental case against long-distance relationships."

It's the same GHGs and airplanes thing, just calculated out to show the impact of your relationship on our atmosphere. Which is to say, your cross-country love sucks! Our local love is superior to yours, because it's eco-friendly! (So what if he beats you? It's better for the environment.)

This is what I hate about "green." The merging of environmentalism and popular culture creating superficial data sets and superficial solutions. "Date local!" Slate cries, thus trivializing everything I believe about sustainability.

Earlier today I was thinking about how I dislike the now-popular word, "locavore." "Locavore" smacks of elitism, something Whole Foods would use in its branding materials. A word that's sure to disappear with the end of whatever era we're in. But eating locally produced food should be as cheap, easy, and accessible as growing a garden in your yard - and not hiring a hipster to do it.

To me, the concept of "green" is a paradox between popularizing environmentalism and slowing climate change, and fueling a slightly softer form of yuppie consumerism. In other words, American life as normal, but with some well-deserved guilt.

Wanna-be emperor has new clothes

I'm kinda grossed out by the Huffington Post. What with their classless impact headlines, and general disdain for design and good taste in favor of highly partisan politicking. I just read the New Yorker profile of Arianna Huffington and was additionally turned off by the air-kissing self-promotion. But anyhow, guilty pleasure: This article and slideshow of Sarah Palin's post-nomination shopping spree.

I love the comparisons made:

...it was revealed that Palin's fashion budget for several weeks was more than four times the median salary of an American plumber ($37,514). To put it another way: Palin received more valuable clothes in one month than the average American household spends on clothes in 80 years. A Democrat put it in even blunter terms: her clothes were the cost of health care for 15 or so people.

It's as if pundits check off the buzz words of the past week. "We gotta get a plumber reference in there, Sam," the editor says. "And the health care. Can we find a Dem to say that? Tell them we definitely don't attribute quotes." (But does the PuffHo have editors? I think probably not.)

I'm still feeling conflicted about media coverage of Palin. She's awful and I can't bear to put my mind in a place where she would be vice president. But those pictures of her bare calves leading into her sexy new shoes? You want to say she's asking for it. That's what they say about rape victims. Not good.

Something of the Mondays

Au pied du pic du Milieu, Béraldi, 1900



Vase avec bouquet

I wish I could crawl into Flickr Commons and live there.

Hey, did you know that there are catastrophic frog die-offs occurring all over the world? I didn't, until today. Our poor little amphibian friends! Never again will I get pissed off when I hear a bullfrog burping and screaming outside my window. Instead I will find him, pin a green-and-brown ribbon to his chest, and call him a survivor.

Also, this: It feels good when a Harvard scientist asks you for help.

My friend on reality TV

Christina is my best friend from college. She's been a ski patroller for the past three years. This summer, when I visited her in Peru, she kept mentioning how she is a star in a reality TV show about ski patrol.

I did not believe her. Christina has a long history of bullshitting me. Claiming she was on a reality TV show seemed a little audacious, though.

She's like the girl who cried reality show.

I said would not believe her until I had evidence. The above video is evidence. A video and a website seems too complex and time-consuming a ruse for a person who does not have a computer. It's true (tru!): I have a friend on reality TV.

I love how in the video she says "dramatic" like, five times. Makes me want to hug her.



awww! so cute! Nini in Peru:

Larval fish & VP Debate drinking game

Bloated much?

These whimsical baby fish come courtesy of the Smithsonian Institution's flickr set of Belize Larval Fish. Every time I see something cool and science-y like this, my first thought is, "What can I do to watch people do this... in Belize... and have someone else pay for it?" That's journalism, right? Someday I'll crack the code.

So the vice presidential debates were last night. I tuned in with hopes of seeing Sarah Palin lose it - and by it I mean her last meal - on the podium, out of nervousness and insecurity. And, does incompetence make you hurl? Unfortunately, she held it down, kept it together, and exceeded everyone's expectations. Which isn't saying much. Expectations are at a historical low these days. In every sector.

Anyhow, if you were clever, you totally could have gotten wasted during the debate, by playing:

THE GREAT VICE PRESIDENTIAL OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA DEBATE DRINKING GAME!!!!

The rules are DRINK when:

• When a candidate blatantly evades the question
• When the moderator calls the candidate out on evading the question
• When a candidate utters "maverick"
• Palin drops the 'g' on the end of her words
• Palin says somethin' unbearably folksy
• Palin mentions that she knows a thing or two about energy
• Palin winks directly at YOU
  
• Biden looks like he's tearing up
• When Wall Street and Main Street are mentioned in the same sentence, in opposition

CHUG when:

• Palin loses it on the podium

Sadly, the chugging opportunity never came. Not to mention I did not have a beer at hand during the debate. I was reduced to looking over Marshall's shoulder at some weird animation representing the Cubs game on the laptop, to alleviate the boredom of talking points and politics in general.