Wednesday, February 28, 2007
Graphics and Video from Children of Men
ForeignOffice created graphic and video content for the film Children of Men. Have a look. I like how the trailer shows the full clip and then cuts to show the same content in the film. And the classic prog rock song In The Court of the King Crimson fit well here and in the film.
Monday, February 26, 2007
Lotus 25th Anniversary
Lotus was founded twenty five years ago this April. An anniversary party is being planned for May. Mitch Kapor and Jim Manzi will be there. Coincidentally, today was my own Lotus anniversary. I started working there in 1990 on Lotus Improv for NeXT. Tempus fugit.
Monday, February 19, 2007
Calvin and Hobbes?
Whatever happened to Calvin and Hobbes? The disturbing answer.
Thursday, February 15, 2007
Dead Sodas
Interesting collection of discontinued sodas. The weirdest one is Orbitz, the soda that had tiny gelatinous, colored balls floating around inside it. Kinda like a soda version of bubble tea.I remember trying Crystal Pepsi. In the picture it's got a brownish tinge but I believe that it was completely clear. It was part of the clear is better craze. Remember Crystal Gravy?
I drank Surge for a while. It was a Mountain Dew clone. I won a Surge-green Nintendo GameBoy from a Surge bottle cap.
These days I don't drink soda very much and try to avoid the caffeinated stuff. When I drink it, I'm more apt to go for root beer or grapefruit flavored stuff.
Wednesday, February 14, 2007
Monoface
Monoface. Kinda strange but fun to play with.
Monday, February 12, 2007
Boston?
A little mean but I thought this video was pretty funny.
Friday, February 09, 2007
Smokin Aces
I saw Smokin Aces last night. The movie's trailers seemed promising — something in the same genre as Guy Ritchie's highly stylized Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch. But Smoking Aces falls far short of those films.
The story revolves around a Las Vegas performer-turned-snitch named Buddy "Aces" Israel who decides to turn state's evidence and testify against the mob. A million dollar contract is taken out on his life. Hit men (and women) descend on Lake Tahoe to take him out while the FBI attempts to protect their star witness. There's a lot of over-the-top action and a quality cast: Jeremy Piven, Ben Affleck, Ray Liotta, Andy Garcia, Jason Bateman and Alicia Keys as a hit women. Bateman and Keys have interesting parts but, for example, Liotta is given too little to do. And after all of the action, the film meanders and falls apart, trying to end on a serious note that doesn't connect with anything that has come beforehand.
The story revolves around a Las Vegas performer-turned-snitch named Buddy "Aces" Israel who decides to turn state's evidence and testify against the mob. A million dollar contract is taken out on his life. Hit men (and women) descend on Lake Tahoe to take him out while the FBI attempts to protect their star witness. There's a lot of over-the-top action and a quality cast: Jeremy Piven, Ben Affleck, Ray Liotta, Andy Garcia, Jason Bateman and Alicia Keys as a hit women. Bateman and Keys have interesting parts but, for example, Liotta is given too little to do. And after all of the action, the film meanders and falls apart, trying to end on a serious note that doesn't connect with anything that has come beforehand.
Thursday, February 08, 2007
Pi Searcher
Pi Searcher can scan the first 200 million digits of π to find an arbitrary string of digits. For example if you had been born today, the date (02082007) occurs at position 9,767,114 in π counting from the first digit after the decimal point.
Can we find all possible birth dates? In other words, what are the odds that a sequence of eight digits occurs in the first 200 million digits of π? Treating the digits of π as essentially random, the answer is that there's 63% chance of finding any particular eight digit sequence. Here's the explanation.
Can we find all possible birth dates? In other words, what are the odds that a sequence of eight digits occurs in the first 200 million digits of π? Treating the digits of π as essentially random, the answer is that there's 63% chance of finding any particular eight digit sequence. Here's the explanation.
Wednesday, February 07, 2007
Polydactyl Cat
Murka, our 17 year-old tabby cat, has more than the usual fives toes on her front paws. In fact, it looks like she has thumbs as you can see below:
Murka the Polydactyl Cat. Sounds prehistoric; something like this. But polydactyl just means "many fingers", whereas pterodactyl means "winged fingers".
Murka the Polydactyl Cat. Sounds prehistoric; something like this. But polydactyl just means "many fingers", whereas pterodactyl means "winged fingers".
New Blogger
I was finally able to upgrade my blog to the "new" Blogger. Up to this point it's complained that it couldn't handle such a large blog. The new UI is much nicer and it seems more responsive. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that everything was converted properly. And, yes, eventually I'm going to move off Blogger, probably to Wordpress.
Sunday, February 04, 2007
The Illusionist
I watched The Illusionist the other night. It's a very good film with an excellent cast (especially Edward Norton and Paul Giamatti). I can't help but compare it to The Prestige, the other film about magicians from last year. They're both enjoyable in their own right but if forced to compare, I preferred The Prestige. It's a much more complex film both emotionally and with its time-shifting narrative.
Pan's Labyrinth
I've had one of Guillermo del Toro's films, The Devil's Backbone, in my Netflix queue for a long time. I want to see it but it's a very dark story so it hasn't bumped up to the top yet. In the meantime, I saw del Toro's film Pan's Labyrinth last week. It's a beautiful film with a complicated mixture of fantasy and realism. It's the story of a young girl, Ofelia, who travels with her pregnant mother to live with her new new stepfather, Captain Vidal, a Fascist officer under orders to rid a rural Spanish territory of rebels. The story takes place in 1944, after Franco's victory.
I'd recommend the film but with some caveats. It takes a pyschic toll on the viewer. A lot of the reviews I've read focus on the very scary Pale Man character. He's certainly a nightmare in Ofelia's fantasy world but her stepfather is far worse, and real. As Keneth Turan's review in the LA Times puts it, Pan's Labyrinth is "a dark and disturbing fairy tale for adults".
I'd recommend the film but with some caveats. It takes a pyschic toll on the viewer. A lot of the reviews I've read focus on the very scary Pale Man character. He's certainly a nightmare in Ofelia's fantasy world but her stepfather is far worse, and real. As Keneth Turan's review in the LA Times puts it, Pan's Labyrinth is "a dark and disturbing fairy tale for adults".
Tidy Up
Most of the IKEA television advertising in the US is pretty boring. Not so with these online ads. I'm not sure where IKEA has run these twisted Tidy Up ads but, as far as I know, they haven't been shown here. All three would probably get quite a few viewer complaints here.
Alfonso Cuaron interview on NPR
Interesting interview with Alfonso Cuaron, the director of Children of Men. The main focus is on an incredible shot in the film that lasts about six minutes, without a cut.
Sadie and Lola
My niece got a teacup Chihuahua for Christmas named Lola. Her family already had a chocolate Labrador named Sadie. The dogs get along great even though there's an enormous size difference — Sadie's head is bigger than Lola's entire body. My sister sent me this photo today of the two dogs together:
We'll need to rethink a few things
Interesting video by the Digital Ethnography working group at KSU on the evolution of the web.
The most wonderful thing about Tiggers
The most wonderful thing about Tiggers is... I'm the only one.
According to How Many of Me, there's only one Bob Congdon in the US. So clearly, I'm the only one.
But my first name is actually Robert. HowManyOfMe says that there are 66 of us. I'm not so sure that's particularly accurate either. At least it didn't say that were none of us. Several names I've tried have had that result. (Via Pete)
According to How Many of Me, there's only one Bob Congdon in the US. So clearly, I'm the only one.
But my first name is actually Robert. HowManyOfMe says that there are 66 of us. I'm not so sure that's particularly accurate either. At least it didn't say that were none of us. Several names I've tried have had that result. (Via Pete)
Friday, February 02, 2007
Save Boston
I'm sure that most readers have heard about the security scare in Boston the other day. Battery-powered advertising signs were mistaken for bombs. Authorities mobilized emergency crews, federal agents, bomb squads, police and even the Coast Guard. Roads and bridges were closed. All for something that turned out to be a nonexistent threat — Well, the character on the sign was flipping the bird, but driving in Boston you tend to see that from time-to-time, usually coming from other drivers. The signs were part of a publicity campaign for Turner Broadcasting's animated cartoon Aqua Teen Hunger Force. They had also been placed in nine other cities, including Seattle, where they didn't cause any concern. So now Boston has become the butt of jokes like this.
All that was a long-winded buildup to the Save Boston game. Zap the Mooninites and keep the city safe. Bucky effing Dent! Funny stuff.
Also, watch the bizarre press conference by Sean Stevens and Peter Berdovsky, the two guys who were charged with placing a "hoax device". A bit over the top but still funny to hear the local media reporters get really furstrated when the two guys aren't "taking this seriously".
All that was a long-winded buildup to the Save Boston game. Zap the Mooninites and keep the city safe. Bucky effing Dent! Funny stuff.
Also, watch the bizarre press conference by Sean Stevens and Peter Berdovsky, the two guys who were charged with placing a "hoax device". A bit over the top but still funny to hear the local media reporters get really furstrated when the two guys aren't "taking this seriously".
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