Month: February 2013

Get Prepared Linky

Two years on from the big Christchurch quake that still casts a very very long shadow over this country. I’ve decided that this is the perfect occasion to check my emergency preparedness kit every year. I’ve been encouraging people to join me, mostly via Facebook – your Like would be welcome, but what I really want is for you to check your kit, too. Here’s the government’s advice site.

Stephanie left this in comments last week:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DUL6MBVKVLI
http://stevemccurry.com/galleries/last-roll-kodachrome
A photographer called Steve McCurry took the last roll of Kodachrome film made by the Kodak factory and turned it into a special project. Well worth a watch.

What is James Bond’s actual favourite drink? A loving and exhaustive article (that still manages to mis-spell whisky). (via Pearce)

Couples switch clothes. A photo series. (via Dylan)

The extraordinary science of addictive junk food – if our biological system is like a computer, junk food makers are like hackers.

Run, Tom Cruise, Run (via David R)

Candyman: the David Klein story – feature documentary about the guy behind legendary American candy ‘Jelly Belly Jellybeans’, made by Wgtn’s own Costa Botes, music by friend of this parish Tom McLeod, and a good watch. It’s on Hulu so you’ll need Media Hint or something to watch it from outside the US. (also via David R) (Here’s my review from when I saw it at film festival – basically, a fascinating character study, very good film, but too long for me to call it great)

Dangerous Minds has the rundown on the Harlem Shake – what the meme is, where it comes from, what it means, and why the people of Harlem think it’s dumb. Sorry, Harlemites, this is bigger than you. Dale Cooper is doing it.

That writer who said those mean things about Our Kate the Princess – read what she actually said, guys. It’s smart stuff. You might not agree, but the media storm over this is embarrassing. (via Marie)

Animated GIFs that do something other than make you laugh: they look amazing. (via Tim Denee)

Strategic blunders in the Battle of Hoth. Comments are good, too.

And carrying on the Jared Diamond attacks, here’s a piece from Slate. I have never read Diamond, but to the best of my knowledge this kind of attack is absolutely in line with the general academic view on his works, but it seems like it really hasn’t escaped that sphere – I’ve seen scientists and other smart people writing off this stuff as sour grapes, even. It’s worth knowing that there’s controversy around him.

Middle-earth linguist, who created languages for Peter Jackson (starting from Tolkein’s baseline), starts a blog.

Goats yelling like humans (via Darshi, and lots of other people)

Alasdair wrote something very cool about short stories and novels and Agatha Christie and Raymond Chandler and Dashiel Hammett. If you like writing or reading or detectives, read it.

Mosh pits: just like particle physics, apparently (that’s one for all the bogan physicists out there)

Jet Jaguar, aka friend of this parish Michael Upton, has released a 3-track EP: Single-Digit High – the first of a bunch to be released this year. Listen to it, download it, pay something if you like. I’ve only listened once so far but it was good. There are beats in it. Give it a try.

you had one job

And finally, via James Dodwell – the cutting edge of fairground rides is quite scary stuff. This piece starts out a bit dry but it is absolutely worth it to see the breathtaking rare footage within.

Valentine’s Linky

Hearts and chocolates and all that. ROMANCE.

Abandoned suitcases of insane asylum patients (via Dylan)

Car gets stuck at 125mph. Amazingly, this ends well.

Sample the delights of Murs’ comments on RapGenius, explaining the lyrics of hip-hop tracks. (Murs is a guy who is a rapper.)

Awesome celebratory Oscars poster. Really clever!

Drones in pakistan – no, not that sort of drone. Cool!

Can anyone remember the film (late 90s I think, maybe Italian?) that was based on this thing – a filmmaker going from small town to small town getting the locals to pay him to make a movie? (In the film I remember it was totally a scam, but the real story involved real filmmaking, and is much weirder for it.)

From mundens: emoji dick

Afghani skateboarding school, for girls (also mundens)

Unfinished scripts

Amazing minecraft creations

Did Lego really get more expensive?

Lego Lovecraft

The Haunted Toaster of 1984 (via Matt B)

The psychedelic world of old computer ads

Some beautiful and haunting photos of abandoned places (this has been shared all over the place – check it out if you haven’t, the pics are lovely)

Literacy privilege? Hmm.

Vaguely rude placenames of the world – via Mike F

Dancing dude meets sign-flipping dude (also via Mike F)

How to videos: how to make a baby (via Dylan)

Why do aircraft still have ashtrays in the toilets?

Winningest TARDIS model ever (via Damon)

See some of the amazing text games being written for Twine

And finally, via Sam Walker, a nice reminder that my culture’s way of doing things is not every culture’s way of doing things:

Spencer Linky

Spencer is a Dungeon Master. Specifically, he’s the guy who put his hand up when (Community creator) Dan Harmon asked the audience at his regular Harmontown night “is there anyone here who knows how to be a dungeon master?” Since then he’s been getting up on stage and running D&D for Dan Harmon, show comptroller Jeff Davis, and a diverse cast of assorted guests. The Harmontown podcast has wormed its way to the top of my podcast priority list in recent times, and Spencer is definitely part of why. He’s just a guy, like so many guys I know, only he’s been caught up in this mad indie-culture anti-structural comedy thing led by a revered cult figure. He used up his annual leave from his job in the back room of an Apple store to go on a U.S. tour with Harmontown. He ran D&D every night on stage. I’m just about to get into the tour podcasts, but today Dan Harmon shared this incredible post about the importance of Spencer. See, it turns out Spencer is the hero of the story. So – Harmontown is often great, and often meandering and a waste of time, but try it. If it’s your thing, it will be your thing in a big way. I’m not even gonna link to it directly. If you’re not intrigued enough to find it yourself, then the time is not right for you.

Via Jon Ball, a drill sergeant in the U.S. asked for a letter of explanation as to why they joined the army. In the stack was this beauty. (Downthread it is revealed the writer is female, and despite the tone of the initial comment, the drill sergeant thinks she’s great.)

Tof Eklund wrote this smart, detailed, well-referenced post about gun control in the U.S. Among things I didn’t know: thanks to heavy NRA lobbying, the CDC stopped all research into gun control issues. Whoa.

Written By A Kid is rocking it, with a return appearance by the kid who wrote the amazing La Munkya story. This is a Valentine’s Day tale (featuring Elvira!):

Any article that starts out talking about the original Cat People will win my attention. This is a marvellous short piece – you get the whole story behind one of TV/film’s biggest current cliches. (Related: I was musing on Twitter recently about the origins of another cliche shot, where the camera looks down on a character and pulls back to a wide shot as they scream “nooooo!” – even without the “Nooo!” I can’t find an overhead pullback earlier than Shawshank…)

Map section:
– Map of a galaxy far, far away… (creative commons, too)
– Man spends 7 years drawing an insanely detailed maze
– Map of Lovecraft’s Dreamlands
– Map of post-apocalyptic Seattle

But consent is HAAAARD

Jemima Khan writes a great, smart, fair overview of the Assange situation – some damning details of how he alienated supporters (including her). The last line is a killer.

Following the Wade Davis article a couple weeks back, The Observer covers more Jared Diamond controversy. Here’s the Stephen Corry article they refer to – I think the Observer gives it a pretty unfair hearing here. I’m much more inclined to trust Corry than Diamond, based just on this material.

Get some Verified Facts! Then refresh the page for even more Verified Facts!

The Lizzie Bennet Diaries – a webseries contemporary adaptation of Pride & Prejudice – featured in the AVClub this week, and that’s enough excuse to include it here for a third time. Try it, Austen fans! (That includes you, mum.)

Dangerous Minds found a copy of David Lynch’s hard-to-find oddity, Industrial Symphony! Quality is poor, but still! I had a VHS tape of this that I recorded off the telly – it was broadcast one Saturday morning at about 10am on a free-to-air channel back in 1990 or so. Lord knows where that tape went, but I’m excited to see this again. (Warning: Nicolas Cage)

Literary translator muses on a transformation in European literature towards a shared Euro-style, and what that says about cultural transformation in the area.

Via auchmill, who happens to be director of an art museum right now: The Art Game, about being an artist. Well worth a look. Takes very little time.

Via Pearce, a classic of the interactive-fiction genre, Photopia – written as part of a grieving process – and its moment of perfect beauty. Play it, I did, it’s short and wonderful and clearly an exemplar of a new kind of literary art production.

And finally… that time Fred Astaire danced wearing an Alfred E. Neumann mask. (via Sinatra-nerd Allen Varney; Mark Evanier put the clip back into circulation, but AICN has the cool photo so I led with that link)

Buy Some Books

Over the last while I’ve been working through a stack of unread books by friends of mine. They are good. You should consider using your human money to add them to your stack of unread books.


The Guilty One
Not a crime book, despite being shelved in a lot of Crime sections, but it has the focus and drive of a screenplay – this sure ain’t a ponderous tale. There’s a lawyer defending a child accused of murder, while he himself is reminded of his own rough childhood and his relationship with the woman who fostered and then adopted him. The beauty of this book is that second relationship. Sometimes the imagery doesn’t quite land and you might see some twists coming but there are plenty of vivid characters here and Minnie is the most fascinating.

You’ll find this one at your local bookstore, in the UK/Aus/NZ at least. Little Brown have been pushing it hard, it was a Richard & Judy pick, etc. The author, Lisa Ballantyne, was a workmate & drinking buddy & occasional writing companion in my Scotland days, and I couldn’t imagine a nicer person to have a big publishing success story.


The Fly Papers Book 1: The Flytrap Snaps
A great, fun read for young’uns (I dunno, age 8-10 maybe? Who knows from age appropriateness) – kid adventure about a boy who befriends a sentient mutant venus flytrap and gets caught up in sinister goings-on. Great characters (particularly every single female character) and an even greater setting – a kind of kids-imagination version of what a filmmaking town would be like. This was nominated for children’s book of the year and I can see why. Johanna is based in the Wairarapa, and is an excellent lady.
(Also I want to mention that physically this is a beautiful book: well-designed, well-made. Johanna’s partner Walter was responsible for that, I think.)


Paranoia: Reality Optional
The dystopic satirical world of Paranoia has long been under-recognised as one of the greatest of all “story worlds” (to use the currently trendy transmedia jargon). It is a future society in thrall to a paranoid computer, while labyrinthine conspiracies and equally labyrinthine bureaucracy reduce everyday life into a series of catch-22 dilemmas. Created for a role-playing game in the early 80s, it has enjoyed ridiculously few forays into other media – three spin-off novels in the 80s, a 6-part comic series in the 90s, and now finally in the 10s there’s another run at using this world outside of gaming.

This particular story is a typically Paranoia combination of madcap hijinks and satirical brutality. It follows one member of Alpha Complex, Jerome-G, as he tries to make sense of the insane world in which he lives. There’s plenty of great laughs and action along the way. Oddly enough, the one section that didn’t quite work for me was where Jerome-G finds himself joining a troubleshooter team for a mission – which is the fundamental mode of Paranoia the game version. Great games and the great stories have different needs and rhythms, and here’s a good instance of that. The diversion doesn’t last long, anyway, and it’s still entertaining watching a typical Paranoia screwjob go even more out of control than usual.

Reality Optional was written by Gareth Ryder-Hanrahan, who is one of the nicest people ever to exist. This is his first novel, and given he’s about to become a dad to twins any day now it might be the last for a while…

This is only available in ebook. Free preview chapters at the link!


Mansfield With Monsters
Local publisher Steam Press released this great collection of reworked Katherine Mansfield stories last year, and to everyone’s surprise it won over the literary establishment as well as the genre folk. The Cowens have a wicked, understated sense of humour in how they choose to subvert each of the chosen Mansfield stories, and in many cases these literature-hacks reveal new aspects of Mansfield’s work. Some of them are big and almost goofy, others are sly and mean, others still portentous and sinister. I dipped in and out of this between other reading, and it was consistently rewarding. I loved it.

This collection was the work of husband-and-wife cool noodles Debbie & Matt Cowens. They have been making cool stuff of various kinds since before I knew ’em, and that’s a long time ago now. It’s awesome that one of their cool things is getting this kind of attention.

—

These are all good things to read. I recommend them all. Of course I am biased in every case, but hey, I could’ve just said nothing at all!

Get Prepared 22 Feb

With the second anniversary of the big Christchurch quake about to arrive, I decided to do something a bit more organised than last year’s “check your prep kits everyone” messages.

I’ve started a Facebook page (that feeds on to Twitter):
Get Prepared 22 February. It makes Feb 22, the earthquake anniversary day, the day we all check and refresh our emergency preparedness kits.

The idea is to use social media and a relevant anniversary to help people follow through on their good intentions. This is, of course, another development of the social psychology I did for my Masters research, like the small group action stuff.

It’d be great if this picked up some momentum, but it should work fine with the number of people it already has. Still, if you’re on FB or Twitter, please consider signing up & sharing with your own contacts.