Monday, April 12, 2010
Monday, March 15, 2010
Jessie’s Little Moment of Win
I just got off of a midnight flight home from a hectic weekend. When I opened my suitcase to unpack it, there was the little note saying that TSA had opened my luggage to inspect it. There was also a bite-size 3 Musketeers bar. IMMD.
If they did that every time, nobody would mind.
Saturday, March 13, 2010
Official "Leave the Damn Clock Alone" Day
Quad-City Times | Get groggy when the clock changes? So do cowsTonight's the night...
"When you move it back, those cows are holding that milk for an extra hour, so you can run into some health problems," he said.
... Michael Downing, who detailed the history of daylight-saving time in a 2005 book [Spring Forward: The Annual Madness of Daylight Saving Time], says the U.S. government has misled Americans on the economic benefits of the time switch. The biggest beneficiaries of the spring clock change aren’t consumers but retailers. People shop more when there’s more light at night.
Friday, March 12, 2010
It’s Not Her Spellcheck That’s Broken
Oh, please, have mercy... I'm laughing, I'm crying, I can't breathe, I'm dying here. "BOARD! Like I don't have anything to do." Bwah ha hah!
Tuesday, March 09, 2010
Mo'Nique is 5th black woman to win acting Oscar - AP
Congratulations 'n' all, but when do we stop counting?
(I'm guessing sometime after the 2nd black woman to win the non-supporting category.)
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Aw, c'mon, you know "that guy"
I'll go out on a limb here and guess that most of the guys on this page didn't turn down a lot of roles. They're not making $10 Million per film; these guys had to work to get paid.
You know, the actors you've seen a hundred times? The ones that sometimes show up on every channel at the same time -- but you can't remember their names? You can look 'em up here.
(Now, where is the "that girl" page, or whatever courtesy and feminism requires us to call it, the page for female "character" actors?)
Thursday, February 18, 2010
Do you know who's watching your webcam?
School Accused Of Spying On Kids In Their Homes With Spyware That Secretly Activated Webcams
from the horrifying dept
A whole bunch of you are sending in this absolutely horrifying story of a school district outside of Philadelphia that apparently gave its students laptops that included hidden software that allowed district officials to secretly turn on the laptops' webcams and monitor student activities, no matter where they were. This all came to light when a student was disciplined for "improper behavior in his home" with the evidence being a photo of the kid from his laptop webcam. The district is now being sued for this. It's rather stunning that anyone thought this was a good idea.
I have a webcam built-in to my laptop. I can't remove it. Maybe I need a piece of tape, or a band-aid, or something.
Monday, February 08, 2010
Sunday, February 07, 2010
Thursday, February 04, 2010
Women and minorities hardest hit
And I thought those bears-in-the-woods commercials made me uncomfortable.
Monday, February 01, 2010
Friday, January 29, 2010
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
Potential Disney Heroines
As Sam Nielson alludes, The Hunchback of Notre Dame as written is not exactly fertile ground for growing Disney princesses (Esmeralda dies, Quasimodo kills Frollo, then starves to death at Esmeralda's graveside). (A strong second place for inappropriate cartoonification is Don Bluth's Anastasia.)
But if that worked... Perhaps the world is ready for Disney's Romeo and Juliet. Or Wuthering Heights. Or Frankenstein...
Sunday, January 17, 2010
Laugh track - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Charley Douglass’s famous invention was properly tested in 1965 when producers were trying to launch Hogan's Heroes. CBS screened two versions of the same episode to measure audience reactions; one contained the laugh track, the other was silent. As Hogan's Heroes required cerebral viewing, the audience watching the silent version were left confused, and the episode failed miserably. The version with the canned laughter succeeded and CBS gave the show a green light. After this incident, no sitcom went on the air without a touch-up from Charley Douglass’s laff box.[2]
Wait. "As Hogan's Heroes required cerebral viewing..."? Say what?
How remarkable that this incident should be the "proper test" that has cursed nearly every comedy since with a canned audience. I'll certainly accept that the premise of Hogan's Heroes was such that, without the laughter, the audience might not understand the show was intended as a light comedy, which knowledge would certainly affect the reception the show received. But it doesn't seem a fair test of the need for "laffs".
Douglass captured many of his recorded "laffs" from the live audience of the Red Skelton Show during Red's weekly pantomime skit. How odd that a feature called the "Silent Spot" should contribute to the lack of silence on television for the following forty-five (and counting) years.
Thursday, January 14, 2010
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
9th Annual No Pants Metro Ride in Washington
It was started by Improv Everywhere in New York, but this gala 9th pantsless year was celebrated (if that's the word) in 43 cities in 16 countries. Among those cities was Atlanta, although you wouldn't know it by the media's reaction. I'm guessing the folks who braved the weather on Sunday morning probably had the MARTA car to themselves.
I considered it, but allowed myself to be frightened off by the temperatures. Maybe next year.
Sunday, January 10, 2010
Saturday, January 09, 2010
Wednesday, January 06, 2010
Remote-Control Model USS Enterprise | Gadget Lab
It flies? Well, no. But what it does, it does quite gracefully.