I particularly love the “midnight buffet”. At midnight the doors to a vast restaurant open and passengers stream in to gorge themselves on elaborate food sculptures, while one of the staff stands above them with a microphone telling them over the speakers the amazing statistics of how much they are consuming on a voyage.

A trailer for a documentary about some crazy Frenchmen who combine ‘climbing, slackline and tightrope walking.’ As well as base-jumping and whatever that thing is called where you fly down the side of a mountain with those batwing suits.

(thanks, Joel)

In my last D&D session a bunch of hobgoblins teleported into a room because someone — I’m not saying who — said that he didn’t want to work as a slave in the necromancer’s tower.

This hobgoblin, additional D&D figures, and more from Sam Bosma.

(Via @wilfreeborn, who says that D&D passed him by, though he remembers a super-secretive group meeting at school.)

Behind the scenes fun: I sewed all the bracelets/hairpieces the night before, as well as hand painted the shoes. To get the leotards I went to a magical warehouse called Danny’s Warehouse where everything is 10 dollars and dug through bins that are taller than I am, looking for six matching leotards. I couldn’t find the kinds of judges outfits that I wanted, so John drove me to Walmart at midnight the night before. We ate Sonic, it was freezing cold in Lancaster. By the time I arrived on set the next day I’d slept two hours out of the past thirty-five.  It was a beautiful shoot.

I stopped the presses once. The 1977 Hanafi siege of D.C.’s city hall ended after the press run had started. It was the lead story in the Birmingham Post-Herald and I was the late copy editor that night. Calls were made, stopping the presses was a costly move and rarely done. But I persisted, saying the story had to be updated. I remember the printers’ boss nodding to me, smiling and saying, “Let her stop the presses.” I was trying to be  authoritative but couldn’t. I looked at the eyeshade wearing men poised over the layouts, started laughing, and said it, “STOP THE PRESSES!”

I had no idea that in three years I would be in Washington, D.C., working for United Press International. No more stopping the presses for me. But that city hall building was the first place I went to cover a story, a news conference with Rosalynn Carter, the first lady, and Mayor Marion Barry, whose election came after he was lauded as a hero in the Hanafi siege. After, I walked to the front of the room, introduced myself, and shook Mrs. Carter’s hand. I told the Georgia native that I had just transferred from Alabama. She said, “I’m so glad to have another southerner up here with us.”

This story was partly an excuse to post a photo, taken in the UPI newsroom in D.C., showing one of my favorite bosses ever, Lucien Carr, a key member of the New York City circle of the Beat Generation in the 1940s. And that’s another yarn for another day.

Holy cow, I don’t know much about this video, or where this is, but some guy on a motocross dirt bike rides along the knife edge of a mountaintop.

It’s funny how when you buy these 2-packs of Grenade Splasherz @ Von’s Grocery Stores (impulse items next to the GIANT $4.49 each size of Red Bull!!!) they carry this warning across the top label: “Do not aim or throw at anyone’s face.”

Much more fun is what it says across the bottom of the label: “Squeeze’em, Soak ‘em, & Throw ‘em!” :^) YAY !!!!!

Anti-whaling activists intercepted Japan’s harpoon fleet far north of Antarctic waters on Sunday, they said, with the help of a military-style drone.

Sea Shepherd Conservation Society spokesman Paul Watson said the unmanned long-range drone, launched from the anti-whaling ship the Steve Irwin, had located the Japanese fleet and relayed the coordinates back to the activists.

I know I should be shocked at what appears to be the ease of obtaining a long-range drone for non-military use, but really I’m just fascinated that the activists named their boat the Steve Irwin.