Risky Linky

It’s Friday linky time!

Tree gives bicycle long slow hug

Timewaster alert: Amazing science facts!

The AVClub interviews Martin Starr, actor best known in this household as Bill Haverchuck on Freaks and Geeks. He just comes across as a fascinating guy. I love that he and Eugene Levy are developing projects together.

NYT feature on Dollar Stores and the economy that sits behind and around them. Fascinating and worth knowing about.

Ursula K Le Guin writes vividly about the use of curse words in modern fiction. Contains bad language, unsurprisingly.

A fun set of engagement pictures. The photographer turns up in the comments to discuss.

Lovely short film set in the world of the Portal video games. Well worth watching even if you, like me, know virtually nothing about Portal.

Fascinating! New version of mass-market war boardgame RISK makes previous games impact on future games – you add permanent stickers to the board after each play, reflecting what happened. The designer chats about the logic behind this – well worth a read.

Incredibly rewarding essay by comics journalist Tom Spurgeon about facing death, loving comics, working hard, and the shape of life.

Now that the Harry Potter film cycle is finished, refresh your minds with these new takes on the characters by artist Makani.

And finally… French firemen do it fast