The stink of mortality
Today Deron took me to the dump, where he and I heaved out a Jeepful of my late mother’s detritus as a thousand gulls swirled about us.
Hmmm?
homemade flying hovercraft
Only $13,000!
Hey, Deron
Remember that time Beavis called 911 to tell them that Butthead was choking? On chicken? And the 911 operator asked if he’d heimliched the victim? And Beavis said, “Did I lick his rectum? NO WAY! But, like, there was this one time….”?
That was funny.
dear clusterflock
Seeing Mike Tyson take a punch to the face — my grandfather was visiting and we were watching the bout together — pause, stand (gloves down), look the guy in the face, bring his glove to his own, tell the guy to do it again, let the guy do it again, go through the pantomime one more time, then knock the guy out with a single punch.
The game Michael Jordan scored what — 42 points? — sick with something that made it almost impossible to stand, draining shot after shot, buoyed by Scottie Pippen to keep him from collapsing at the end of the game.
Emmitt Smith running for 175 yards against the Giants after dislocating his shoulder in the first half.
The 1980 Lake Placid hockey match.
Dear Clusterflock:
Which sporting events had the greatest impact on you?
The Martin Jetpack
The jetpack is made from carbon fiber, with a touch of kevlar in the rotors, and generates 600lbs of thrust. Because the center of gravity is below the “center of thrust” (a notional point between the engines), it is self-righting: if the pilot lets go of the controls, he hovers steadily in one spot. Unlike other sci-fi vehicles, the jetpack doesn’t require plutonium or even garbage for power. Instead, it runs on ordinary gasoline, chugging down around 10 gallons per hour (a full tank of five gallons will give you half an hour of flight time, enough to get you to the office).
It’s safe, “affordable”, and best of all is classified as an ultralight so it requires no pilot license. The future is almost here, I suppose.
photo out of context
Hey bitches
From here.
let’s hear it for the who
Shit William Shatner Says
Twitter sensation Shit My Dad Says is becoming a TV pilot with William Shatner set to play the larger-than-life dad at the center of it.
What will they call the show if the pilot makes it?
urban skiing
In Pittsburgh, we don’t get two-plus feet of snow in 24 hours – but that happened two weeks ago. And some people knew what they should do… (via @woycheck and @schulman)
Thank you, Cindy.
Not only is Cindy Scroggins a performance artist, but she is an information specialist. If ever you are looking for lodging in the Dallas area, you just call up Cindy. She will not steer you wrong.
At The La Quinta Uptown, some of the rooms have heat. Mine even had hot running water for two or three minutes. If you want to wash but your timing is off, you can fill the sink with cold water, then add water you’ve boiled in the coffeemaker and give yourself a whore’s bath.
Read more
Hey, Deron
Let’s Talk Ned Hepburn.
Ned Hepburn is the best. He’s like this experiment in writing-yourself-to-life, as I can never tell what is a real memory and what is an invention that plays true. He’s also keenly, achingingly, hyper-aware of everything that goes on around him in this disturbing GoodFellas-level-of-detail way.
it’s rather sad, because i’ve hung out with “normie” women before and they’re really nice people. they like shitty bands like The Fray and think that “Chuck Klosterman” is something you get from sleeping with guys with leather jackets. they’re nice people, though. i just know that we can never be together. we are too fundamentally different. she says tomatoes, and i say that i liked tomatoes better before “everybody else started liking them”.
the only thing that overlaps normies and scene kids is Trader Joes, bad television, and the underlying reality that “i hate her because she owns a camera and calls herself a photographer” and “she hates me because i own a MacBook and call myself an artist”.
Perhaps it’s too-too to like it when someone points out obvious things. I don’t give a crap. Hepburn loves Los Angeles, Natalie Portman, getting high and is writing some of the funniest stuff around. Yet another person I wanna hang out with for an afternoon and interview cause it’d be a great story no matter what happened.
Lego Remington .45 Revolver
Click through for more.
anti-theft lunch bags
(via marginal revolution)
Trailer for El Topo (Alejandro Jodorowsky. 1970)
The strangest movie I’d recommend?
Allen Klein presents an ABKCO Film.
Scene From Last Weekend
Charlie Brooker — how to report the news
Happy Birthday
Happy Birthday, Simone.
Meet The Helpsters
Sweet! Our Mary came up with the gestating project they mention:
Once derided as hipsters, let’s call them helpsters. Instead of disaffected aesthetes with nihilistic tendencies, we see motivated and committed Samaritans. They fight overdevelopment, though it was their presence (and buying power) that drew the developers and realtors in the first place. They defend the rights of tenants, since landlords want to squeeze their diverse neighbors and artist friends out and move a new crop of more affluent—and inevitably less interesting—interlopers in. At the moment, efforts to increase community gardens, bike racks and green spaces are being discussed. Others organize meals for the poor and bike tours of toxic sites. One currently gestating project, to develop Brooklyn’s own currency, would make even old-school lefties blush.
touch sensitive book jacket
(thanks, Elisabeth)
No Substitutions
The couple wanted to start a business that reflected their values: a neighborhood shop that purchases top-quality ingredients directly from farmers, makes every pizza by hand and serves great food at affordable prices. They also wanted to make sure their business did not take over their lives.
I love this business concept.
Brick Tumblr
For any of you that loved Brick, the 2005 teen noir film by Rian Johnson, he recently started a tumblr to put up various images. Focus Features had taken down the official Brick site for a while, and the Tumblr is filled with goodies.
Freddy’s is fighting and they’re doing it on Fox News, baby
A couple of friends of mine were on Fox News yesterday morning, to talk about their fight to save Freddy’s, a hugely loved local bar in Prospect Heights, Brooklyn – as well as many homes and businesses - from being snatched in a landmark eminent domain ruling.
Basically, the New York supreme court has decided that billionaire developer Bruce Ratner can seize property in the 22 acres of the “Atlantic Yards” footprint in order to build an arena and some tower housing that is deeply unwanted by the people of the neighbourhood. It is now enshrined in law that it is fair game for the state to seize property from small businesses, homeowners and renters, if the billionaire or corporation who wants to seize their properties can pay higher real estate taxes to the state. This is an outrageous abuse of the idea of eminent domain which was originally designed to be used ‘for the public good’.
The community has fought against this for 6 years now, and the last appeal against this use of eminent domain was decided last month in favour of the billionaire. Two days before Christmas, Forest City Ratner initiated proceedings to seize the homes and businesses in Prospect Heights, Brooklyn.
The message is: if you are a homeowner in the United States of America, anyone who wants to seize your property is now enabled by law to do that, so long as he is richer than you. That is now enshrined in law, in a decision handed down by the highest court of the land.
Freddy’s is more than a bar. It’s a community, a true neighbourhood sanctuary, and a fantastic music venue. It is expected that the site that Freddy’s sits on will fit a few SUVs in the parking lot that is planned for it. Handcuffs have been installed in the bar, and there are more than enough people willing to chain themselves to the bar and go to jail to defy the bailiffs if and when they arrive at Freddy’s door.
The fifth amendment to the United States Bill of Rights
prohibits the federal government from depriving any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.
Well, they got their due process of law, but it is bad bad law indeed. More legal challenges are on the way.
UPDATE: I have now amended this post to reflect the fact that this decision was originally handed down by the United States supreme court, which means that it can happen legally anywhere in the US. It has been challenged in the state of New York in this case, but the ruling apparently (and I am not a lawyer or an American citizen) stands countrywide.
UPDATE again: George Will wrote this op-ed column in the Washington Post about the ruling and “the twisted meaning of ‘blight’”. Read it.