Bowling Ball and Feathers, in a vacuum chamber

What is there to say? Science Rocks.


Sorry about the hiatus.

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RockStar Parking

Plus the driver strolls out of the car, cool as can be.

Amazing.

You've got to wonder, what was the driver doing to get that kind of takeoff? And then, to stick the landing so perfectly? I mean, even the East German Judge would give that ride a Perfect 10.

I'm not at all certain professional drivers being paid a truck-load of money could recreate that takeoff, flight, flip and oh so perfect landing, AS A STUNT. I'm sure if they tried, it'd be damn near-impossible.

Here's to the RockStar Driver who got it right the first time -- and to the Brew Master who bottled whatever the hell he was drinking. Cheers!

July 31: (Fixed the video)

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As If

h/t Salon.

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Trying to CAP the Gulf Oil Well

LIVE: Watch the video streams as
BP tries to CAP the Gulf oil spill.
(You may need a plugin to watch the video streams.)

This is AMAZING stuff.

I can see them, right now, trying to cap the bleeding well, LIVE on the PBS site.

There are 12 video streams, 8 of which are live right now, 10 of which were live ten minutes ago, 1 of which shows oil still boiling out. All this over a mile down below the ocean with a pressure of thousands of pounds per square inch in water of just above freezing.

In the midst of all this, there are little fishes swimming in and about the well. "Hello little fishes." *waves to the fishies* I wonder how they'd taste on a cracker with a bit of cheese. Oily, I suspect.

Enjoy the show. With a bit of luck -- and by "a bit" I mean one hell of a lot -- the well might be capped this weekend.

Failing that, the two relief wells continue to be bored, with BP asserting they remain on track for a mid-August interception with the blown well. Hitting a target seven inches wide, after going through a mile of water and then digging down another four to five miles through rock, sand, and other nasty gunk.

Say what you will about BP -- Lord knows I've said plenty, starting with the word "fuck" and including the words "arrogant" and "assholes", repeated in varied combinations and grammatical forms -- however this kind of engineering genuinely amazes me.

Come on BP. Make it bloody happen. Today.
LIVE: watch for yourself.

H/T: Slate -- 20,000 Leaks Under the Sea: The insanity of deepwater oil wells.

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"Come As You Are"

Gay Themed McDonald's Ad is Viral Success

This French McDonald's ad has gone viral (almost 1.3 million views on the main YouTube, not counting copies.)

Bill O'Reilly of course, went bug-fuck nuts when exposed to the ad, swearing that no such ad would EVER come run in the masculine United States of America.

Idiot.

I think the ad is sweet.

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I'm a Single Lady

Good Dad

Good Dad for rapidly recognizing his screw-up and correcting as best he could. Plus Full Props to Dad for posting-up on YouTube.

Most dads wouldn't have the guts to expose themselves so fully. 3.5 Million hits later... *smiles* ...we have real evidence being authentic works. Regardless of the public response or lack thereof, posting-up the video -- so others learned and so he and his family wouldn't forget -- was a great move. (More evidence in my view that this is a Good Dad and a good family.)

This is a family that sings together, corrects mistakes together, creates their public identity together, and are Single Ladies together.

Right on, Sister. Everybody DANCE.

H/T Feminist Law Professors.

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GNB Late Night: Social Media Revolution

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Dirty, Dirty, Evil Hit

Dante Wesley Ejected After
Vicious Illegal Hit on Clifton Smith

I couldn't quite see if Fair Catch was called but it doesn't matter. The point is, Smith didn't have the ball. Fact, he was nowhere near the ball. Wesley is an EIGHT YEAR VETERAN, a Special Teams master -- precisely the guy you want settling the rooks down, not jacking everyone up with this kind of unsporting treacherous truly evil fucking hit -- whom was trusted by his teammates, his coaches, the opposing players and their coaches, and by the officials, to play fucking football.

This wasn't football. This was an assassination, an attempt to take a helpless man standing fully exposed and hurt him for life and/or kill him. It was an evil, vicious, predatory intentional move made with full awareness. There is NO excuse for it. None.

After further review today in the Commissioner's Office, Wesley was suspended without pay for one additional game. I would have thrown his ass out for an entire season.

Smith was on the ground totally unconscious for an entire minute. One whole minute. The odds of him dying early, of Smith having early onset Alzheimer's Disease, hell, of just getting a minor concussion which he plays through and doesn't dare tell anyone because he's afraid of being fired -- NFL players have the crappiest contracts in all of professional major league sports, not to mention those contracts are year-to-year (if I remember correctly) -- just went sky-fracking-high.

And Wesley's punishment for maiming Smith is one game without pay. For which Wesley absolutely will get major bonus money this coming year come contract-renewal time, all in exchange for having intimidated the hell out of the opposing team. One man's next 30-40 years (if he lives that long, and if he does he'll only live it in massive pain and/or with brain damage and/or unable to know what is even going, all due to this one hit Wesley put on him this past Sunday) all in order for one team to gain an ongoing advantage in professional football.

It wasn't an accident. It was an assassination.
Eight-year special team's veterans don't have accidents at that level.
Period. Full stop.

The NFL is really pushing hard with its officials to stop letting its ball handlers get knocked out, especially the high-priced talent such as quarterbacks and receivers. Hit a QB after he's got rid of the ball and you are D-O-N-E. Hit a kicker after he's got rid of the ball and it'd be better for you if he'd kicked that ball up your ass. Same with hitting a receiver on a crossing pattern all stretched out up in the air (totally vulnerable) before he touches the ball. You can hit that stretched-out receiver (or QB or kicker), but if you mistime it so you even breathe on him before his fingers touch the pigskin, pack. You're done.

Problem is, the league has not yet put in that PUSH when it comes to Special Teams. That said, these officials handled this incident damn fine. From breaking up the fight between the teams, to making sure the fight didn't get worse, to reviewing what happened and throwing Wesley out of the game.

I don't know if the officials could have done anything before the game to stop the incident -- perhaps have laid down the law with both teams as to their expectations regarding hits on people when they didn't have the ball -- but I don't see as to why they'd have done that, if only because what Wesley did was SO FAR FUCKING OUTSIDE THE GODDAMN RULES that No One saw this coming.

Wesley hit Smith at least a full second before the ball arrived. The punt landed on the ground after Smith was already down on the turf unconscious and not moving.

It was a slaughter, an attack, an intentional attempt to hurt Smith for good. That Smith was unconscious for over sixty seconds tells you how damn close Wesley came to succeeding.

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Sara Robinson on Thom Hartmann: Health Care in Canada

“A Moral No-Brainer.”

Sara was interviewed yesterday by Thom Hartmann on health care in Canada. Wonderful stuff.

And at Campaign for America's Future where she's a Fellow, Sara blogs on the same topic with The Health Care Debate: Another Country Heard From.

Enjoy.

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Daily Show: Jim Cramer Interview

Watch this.

No kidding.

It isn't just that Jon Stewart is brilliant and hands Cramer (host of CNBC's Mad Money) his ass. That's nice, but really, who cares... (Warning: NSFW Language throughout interview.)

Watch this because by the end you'll grasp at a deep level how the financial media has not just

• failed to report on the problems in the markets,
• failed to do any investigative reporting, but also
• failed to call "fire" when an inferno was ablaze.

As Jon makes clear and Jim Cramer eventually cops to, CNBC and the rest of the financial "media" helped set the financial markets on fire through their selective, biased, and non-journalistic "reporting" whose primary purpose was to entertain, get ratings, and promote the market (which they themselves and their bosses and organizations were invested in.) Their shows were ENTERTAINMENT, not journalism, having little to (yes, I'll go there) nothing to do with reporting of actual financial news or markets in any journalistic sense.

These so-called financial media were and are part of the fraud which caused the bubble leading to the collapse.

Jon calls them/him out, and Cramer admits it.

An absolute must watch all the way through.

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Jim Cramer Unedited Interview Pt. 1

Daily Show Full Episodes
Important Things w/ Demetri Martin

Political Humor
Jim Cramer

Jim Cramer Interview, CNBC: Part 1

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Jim Cramer Unedited Interview Pt. 2

Daily Show Full Episodes
Important Things w/ Demetri Martin

Political Humor
Jim Cramer

Jim Cramer Interview, CNBC: Part 2

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Jim Cramer Unedited Interview Pt. 3

Daily Show Full Episodes
Important Things w/ Demetri Martin

Political Humor
Jim Cramer

Jim Cramer Interview, CNBC: Part 3

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Ricky Gervais and Elmo

Ricky Gervais and Elmo crack each other up.

This is a preliminary peek at an interview scheduled to air in November 2009 for Sesame Street's 40th Anniversary episode.

The producer has lost control of the interview. Instead of talking about charity, they turn to "what NOT to ever" talk about on Sesame Street. Heh.

Enjoy.

H/T Huffington Post.

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Dancing in the Liverpool Street Station, London

T-Mobile Commercial

Huffington Post

Telecom giant, T-Mobile, chose this location in the UK as the backdrop for a new advertisement, filmed during rush hour. It took 8 weeks of planning, 8 sound tracks of 60s thru 90s music, 10,000 people who auditioned, 400 people chosen, 10 hidden cameras, and a terminal full of unsuspecting commuters...

Public Reaction

Would you have danced?

Watched?

Or run for your train which you can't miss?

What are you doing today, hmmm?

When was the last time you danced? Why? With whom?

Dance for at least 10 seconds. Report back...

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“It's A New Day Coming”

will.i.am via Oprah

Yeah baby!

(We'll likely replace the above live version with a different approved version, so watch this one while you can. *smiles*)


Dipdive version.

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JCPenny Speed Dressing

This Cannes Film award winning commercial is (not surprisingly)raising eyebrows. I love it. Great use of story. Not much in the way of commercial substance-- which are the best kinds of commercials. And the opposing internet and fundie buzz-wars are going to put JC Penny on the cool list for a bit. Hard to do when you are a company who started around 1902!!! (h/t dropkick monkey)

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Laugh, Laugh, Laugh

Note: Not precisely work safe everywhere; use caution.

The 50 Funniest Comedy Clips Ever

Nerve and IFC dare to rank great comedy with their:

The 50 Greatest Comedy Sketches of All Time

I don't know if I agree with them. I do know, I've wasted the last three hours.

You have been warned.

h/t Boing Boing.

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Spike Lee on Filmmaking and Diversity

Spike Lee. March 26, the Beverly Wilshire Hotel.

Too wonderful not to share.

h/t The Hollywood Reporter.

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Liz Phair Rocks

As long as we're throwing up music...

There's a reason Liz Phair meant so much to so many, back when.

Everyone I hung with burned out at least two, maybe three of her albums.

Warning: Flower is NOT safe for work. Not not not. Neither are the others. All three however, rock hard.

Enjoy.


Fuck and Run -- Live in London 10/07/03


Flower -- Live in London 10/07/03


Divorce Song -- Live at Tower Records

Lyrics
Fuck and Run
Flower
Divorce Song

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Violinist Viviane Hagner (Age 14)

Zubin Mehta Conducts Israel Philharmonic with Viviane Hagner
Zubin Mehta conducts the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra along with 14 year old violinist Viviane Hagner performing a piece by Camille Saint-Saens. This concert was in Tel Aviv in 1990.

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Bush Booed By Baseball

h/t Think Progress.

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Sarah, Matt, Ben & Stars on Jimmy Kimmel

NOT SAFE For Work. Really. No kidding.
Sara Silverman and Matt Damon.


NOT SAFE For Work. Really. No kidding.
Jimmy Kimmel, Ben Affleck & Stars

And in the same mood, if you missed it some years ago...


Also NOT SAFE For Work. Not as rough, but still not safe.
Scotty Doesn't Know

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