Wednesday, November 26, 2008

It's a smorgasbord day, in honor of the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday (and the days off that it entails)! Thanks to everyone who sent in links!

Both Cassandra and the Graveworm sent me this awesome story about a piano found in the woods of Massachusetts - in pristine condition, complete with bench. It's obviously for woodland animal concerts.

The winners of the Pimp My Bookcart contest have been announced! Congrats, everyone!

Danny, from the official Folderol outpost station in the Netherlands, points out this awesome quiz in which mimes re-enact famous album covers. Both he and I only got three right, but those of you who know your album names could probably beat our score handily!

If you're a librarian and looking for good weeding music (weeding your book collection, that is), there's a swap designed just for you! The deadline is December 31.

From Cassandra: Jupiter, Venus and the moon are all close together for Thanksgiving this year. Sounds auspicious, doesn't it?

Also from Cassandra: Merriam-Webster's word of the year is "bailout," DNA testing by authorities could extend to family members, and an article on the umpteenth death of irony includes this great quote: "When will someone proclaim the death of iceberg lettuce? I’m sick of it making my salads boring.”

Jim Denevan creates huge, gigantic, awe-inspiring designs. Go and look.

Alan Abel's website chronicles the parade of hoaxes he's created throughout the years.

And finally, isn't this what all puppeteers aspire to, in the end? A whole episode of Space Ghost recreated by puppets! Awesome, absurd stuff.

Happy Thanksgiving and/or weekend, everyone! See you on Monday.

Tuesday, November 25, 2008

Finally, someone has the answer to where the flying jetpacks are! Kudos to this brave soul. If you prefer to stay on the ground, you could accessorize with this stylish air traffic controller headset. Finally, some love for the air traffic controllers! You'll appreciate them when dirigibles are zooming about haphazardly!

Via Brass Goggles: "This steampunk cell phone concept has no display. No 3G. No data plan. No games. It doesn't even have a dial pad. You make your calls with binary-coded punch cards, steampunk."

Attention, photographers with a steampunk bent: Gatehouse Gazette wants you! The deadline is December 19th, so get to snapping.

Not everyone can be like Daniel Jubb, former child prodigy and currently mustachioed rocket scientist. But if you have aspirations along those lines, the incredible Information Unlimited shows you how to build, tinker and invent to a seemingly endless level.

Speaking of endless, I have only just now seen the stunning array that is the Neo-Victorian slide show. Wow. What fun!

While not exactly steampunk, pirates and steampunks often find common ground. This live map of current worldwide piracy might interest both groups. (Italy?)

Monday, November 24, 2008

I am back and more or less functional. Ergo, here's a bunch of arty links for you this dreary Monday!

A whole mess of punk rock memorabilia goes up for auction today at Christie's. Wow. Full listing and pricing is available!

Monty Python now has their own YouTube channel, figuring to join 'em if you can't beat 'em.

Google has an incredibly huge collection of images from Life magazine. Don't blame me if you end up spending hours there.

Jane Austen apparently mentioned baseball in 1789, which is throwing baseball historians into a furor.

I think I linked to the possibility of New York's Bellevue becoming a hotel before, but now there's a detailed article on it from New York Magazine.

Forget skyscrapers -- now we're going to have superscrapers! I look forward to seeing a spacescraper before long.

Friday, November 21, 2008

My body has decided to recalibrate its digestive system, apparently, and so I'm home today. Fortunately it's the day for links from others! Thanks, everyone!

From Nicole: a two-faced kitten is born. Um, aww?

Keeping with the cat theme, Cassandra sends in news of cheetah cubs and an article on the sadness of LOLcats.

Also from Cassandra: Some deep philosophical questions to honor World Philosophy Day; an article on the 30th anniversary of the Jonestown Massacre; and some new investigations into deja vu.

From Danny: build your own papercraft graf zeppelin! Do it this weekend!

From Zazoo: the pygmy tarsier has been rediscovered in Indonesia, and it's super-cute in a Dark Crystal sort of way.

Have a spiffy weekend, everyone! See you Monday.

Thursday, November 20, 2008

Cryptographers rejoice! Bletchley Park has been saved!

Barack Obama is going to have 21st-century fireside chats on YouTube. It's so nice to have a leader who embraces technology, isn't it?

The FTC has put out a bulletin giving advice on how to shop for the holidays in these turbulent economic times. It's mostly common sense, but still useful.

The Australians had a brilliant idea: wheelbarrow book service on the beach! They should add in an auxiliary traveling bar wheelbarrow and it'd be perfect.

The Guardian has two neat history-related articles: one on female war photographers and one which says the Colossus of Rhodes is going to be rebuilt as a giant light sculpture!

Somehow I managed to miss the fact that Emily of Shelf Check (and you are reading Shelf Check, right?) has another weblog called Poesy Galore. I highly recommend this entry.

Tomorrow: links from others!

Wednesday, November 19, 2008

As Zazoo says, forget about important issues like helping the poor: churches need to focus on banning garden gnomes! They're evil!

Cassandra sent in a great article about the new ways to celebrate death. Gnomes not included at present.

The amazing Wellcome Library now has its own weblog!

A prehistoric site 6,000 years older than Stonehenge? Gobekli Tepe, located in Turkey, may have much to tell us.

And finally, something purely awesome: PlayZombies. Playmobil meets the undead, and everyone wins!

Tuesday, November 18, 2008

Thanks to this wonderful post at Metafilter, I found out that you can watch "real life" footage taken in London in 1904, as well as Calcutta in 1899. It's pretty amazing stuff. If you like this sort of thing, you may also like Oddee's post in which photographs of Paris in 1900 are compared to those taken in 2008.

Because I am all about Jules Verne, I think this demonstration of making a pop-up book of 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea is just awesome. Make your own giant kraken!

Also, the always-fantastic Instructables shows you how to make your own raygun, so you can properly fend off your giant kraken.

For attire, B. and I have been having a wonderful time sending each other links from Uniformalwearhouse. Some offerings are just goofy, but they have some great gems there if you search long enough!

Other weblogs to check out: Steampunk Pix, which provides just what it says, and Alrededor del Mundo's steampunk-themed site (written in Castillan Spanish).

Monday, November 17, 2008

Happy Monday! There's a Flickr pool for all the photos of the Join the Impact protest from last Saturday. It was lousy weather here, but there was a big turnout, all things considered.

Art: The School of Visual Arts in NYC is about to begin an exhibition based on Lovecraft's Call of Cthulhu, and it looks to be as spooky as you might suspect. (They're a little wobbly on the spelling of Cthulhu, but hey, that's understandable.)

Literature: The 400-year-anniversary of John Milton's birth is this year, and there have been all sorts of observances and celebrations. Over the weekend, a marathon reading of Paradise Lost took place.

Philosophy: Wow, Wittgenstein had one seriously weird life.

Photography: The amazing story of discovered photos from Hiroshima immediately after the atomic bombing of the city.

And finally, since the last link was quite somber and overwhelming, here's a bit of humor. A man tries to offer a drawing of a spider as payment for his electric bill. Polite confusion results.

Friday, November 14, 2008

Friday! That means it's time for links sent in by others. Thanks, everyone!

From the Graveworm: "Didn't Lovecraft's At the Mountains of Madness start off just like this?"

From Bunny: At last, the flying cars are coming!

Cassandra sent in a whole bunch of great stuff:

From Zazoo: Doctors in Berlin are surprised to find that a bone marrow transplant seems to have cured a patient of AIDS. Further research is pending.

If you aren't following Stephen Fry on Twitter, you should be -- he's in Africa right now and meeting lemurs!

And finally, here's a moment of weirdness: Hello Kitty, Lady Bunny, Richie Rich, and Lisa Loeb all in the same place. Wow.

Have a spiffy weekend, everyone! Hope to see you at the protests. Back on Monday.

Thursday, November 13, 2008

Happy World Usability Day, everyone! Go forth and make the world a little more usable! In that spirit:

-- The Obama administration has several pages of online information up already, including a page devoted exclusively to the transitional phase. Very cool.

-- Google is tracking flu trends across the country. Ohio looks as if the flu is imminent.

-- More and more lawyers are using Twitter these days to communicate.

Not really usable, but very fun: the good people at BookNinja had a "rebranding" contest for book covers. I especially like the new design for Kerouac's On the Road, but they're all fantastic.

Tomorrow: links from others! Send them on in and see your name in lights tomorrow. Or in 12-point type, rather.

Wednesday, November 12, 2008

While the Spooky Librarians demographic is very happy with the results of the presidential election, we are very sad about the results of the Proposition 8 vote in California. So we're going to be at the local protest this Saturday, along with the Club Creatures and anyone else who'd like to join us! You can find out if there's a protest near you at Join the Impact's main site. (Many thanks to Jere for posting this originally.)

If you're not in America this weekend, there's lots to do. Pirates Week is going on in the Cayman Islands, the Canadians start the holiday season early with the Santa Claus Parade in Toronto, and the annual Pushkar Camel Fair is happening in India!

Spooky fun link of the day: the wonderful Paxton Gate store in San Francisco is opening a children's store, and they're open to listening to artists with ideas. Check them out if you can! (I've been there, and it's a fantastic store. I can't wait to see the new place.)

Tuesday, November 11, 2008

Oh dear. The LOLcat world and the steampunk world have finally collided.

Meanwhile, Married to the Sea displays another problem with dirigibles -- the difficulty of quick escape.

Have you been reading the Gatehouse Gazette? Issue 3 is out!

Edward Gorey fans will love the tale of the Calamity Coach. Trust me.

I've been saving Dave Lowe's post on how to make creepy books since Halloween, but it occurs to me that the process would also work well for steampunking journals and the like.

A heart made of gears? Yes! And it turns and spins!

For the UK readers, it's not too early to begin preparing for the Dickens Christmas Fair. For those in the US, the burgeoning Cincinnati League of Steampunks is having a tea excursion this Saturday -- if you're in the area and interested, email them or send me a message!

Monday, November 10, 2008

Good morning! Here are the Monday links.

Somehow I missed the news last month that Bram Stoker's great-grandnephew is writing the sequel to Dracula. That should be interesting.

Attention, fellow readers labeled as Generation X: Did you read Highlights as a kid? You may love this website. It even has a quiz determining if you're more like Goofus or Gallant!

Artist of the week: Mark Wagner and his art from $1 bills.

What phrases get on your nerves the most? The OED has compiled a list.

Last week was not only important for elections, but it also brought the first scholarly conference on heavy metal in Salzburg! You really have to check out the program for "Heavy Fundamentalisms: Music, Metal & Politics." I love how a session on hardcore profanity and hard living is immediately followed by a tea break.

Friday, November 07, 2008

Friday! Links from others, and links found during the week. Thanks, everyone!


Seen on many weblogs this week: The Message to Obama Flickr pool. Even Scooter, the Club Creatures' dog, got in on the act and sent a message to the new president. (We are going to ask our cast of puppet MCT characters if there's anything they would like to say.)

Also, I had no idea that the Obama campaign had a Flickr account! The photos of Election Night are especially amazing.


From Tim: the voting sticker many of us wanted to get.

From Cassandra: the Leopard Man of Skye trades in his wild lifestyle for a comfortable retirement home. Well, these things happen.

Also from Cassandra: the story of a Los Angeles priest who came out against California's Proposition 8; information on a new invention which can analyze conversational patterns; and the conundrum of pregnancy among evangelical teenagers.

From Jeff M.: Depeche Mode playing "Enjoy the Silence"...atop the World Trade Center. Wow, I'd never seen this before.

From Holly: a retrospective on the Muppets is going on this month at the Siskel Film Center in Chicago! Ooooo.

VectorPark is addicting. And confusing, at times.

And lastly, John Scalzi discovered that the most important election of all went down in Colorado on Tuesday. Who knew?

Have a spiffy weekend, everyone! See you Monday.

Thursday, November 06, 2008

Have you checked out the entries for the 2008 Pimp My Bookcart contest? There's ten pages worth! I think the Indiana Jones cart is the best, but I am also partial to the Spookmobile (driven by a skeleton) and the Popemobile. Winners will be announced soon!

Also seen on Unshelved: this awesome CHOOSE BOOKS t-shirt. I keep waiting for this part of '80s fashion to come back in style. It's got to, sooner or later!

Sad news: Rex Libris has ended its run. Go and get the whole series while you can!

If you're interested in Doris Lessing's work, check out the Golden Notebook Project, which begins next Monday.

If your tastes tend more toward the Beat Writers, you will be pleased to know that the collaborative novel by William S. Burroughs and Jack Kerouac, And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks, is finally going to see the light of day. (Incidentally, check out the photo in this article. Burroughs looked ancient even when he was young.)

FaberFinds is an awesome idea. Out-of-print books are brought back for two weeks, and they listen to suggestions!

If you're not reading Wild Secret Library (formerly known as the Secret Library Workers Union), you should be. This is my most recent favorite. "And everything they touched turned into information."

Here's one for the law librarians, courtesy of Cassandra: a man is suing to stop his own autopsy. It's actually very reasonable.

And here's one for Cassandra: the Mind Museum in Rome. Let's go visit!

Wednesday, November 05, 2008

Also, John Scalzi has a good morning-after post. (But today, celebrate!)



Swiped from Dawn. I am so happy our state pulled it together!



(Not so happy about California and Proposition 8. But that will be another battle later. Right now, I'm just happy about hope.)


Tuesday, November 04, 2008


Go and do it, if you haven't already! The Spooky Librarians got to their polling station fifteen minutes before it opened this morning, and there was already a line of about fifty people. It's rather inspiring. We're hoping for the best.

On to steampunk links! You could travel the globe in considerably less time than Phileas Fogg did, but it's still expensive. (Plus you probably miss out on all sorts of wacky adventures.)

Reports are trickling in from the recent steampunk convention, and it sounds like a good time was had by all, especially the makers! And speaking of makers, Datamancer has a new beautiful ergonomic keyboard for viewing, and Jake von Slatt is working on a steampunk book with Jeff Vandemeer. Congratulations all around!

Scuttlebuggery is a slightly complicated but beautiful Flash game, full of absinthe and turpentine and spookiness. Go!

More game news: Gatheryn, an upcoming MMO game, looks beautiful. I am not well versed in the multiplayer online world, so this is purely a view from the sidelines - but it appears promising!

I had never heard of the UK's "sound mirrors" before this week, but apparently they are still standing, long after their use has faded.

An obituary of Martin Tytell also serves as a beautiful elegy for typewriters; those of us who love to fiddle with non-electronic devices can understand.

Monday, November 03, 2008

Happy November! We had a fun Halloween and a fun party - photos are on Flickr. The Club Creatures also put some pix up, and Jere even has some video!

What books do Obama and McCain like, and what does that say about them? In other election-related happenings, check out the Gum Election. It looks like Obama is winning!

The Nationaal Archief, the largest archive in the Netherlands, has joined the Flickr Commons. There are some fascinating photos in the collection, including many from WWII.

A leftover Halloween link: the image of vampires has evolved continuously throughout the years. Who knew the original Dracula may have resembled Walt Whitman?

Imagine what Coney Island may yet become! That's the plan, at any rate.

And lastly, test your color vision skills with this hue test. I got a 7 (a perfect score is zero), which I considered pretty darned good.