Supercut the Wabbit

Happy Easter, everybunny...

I been blessed, and I been cursed...all my lies have been unrehearsed...

• Nick Offerman break dances - I appreciate answer to 'how did you get so manly' question.
• Climbing the pyramids - It's illegal but fascinating.
• The Chickeneers "Ho Hey" - You belong with me, you're my chicken.

• 99 steps of Progress - I particularly like Apollo and Psychadelia.
• Uni Watch's MLB roundup - The Reds have a new alternate jersey.
• Cat walks dog - cute...

• How to improve your wifi signal with just a soda can - May have to try this...
• SMBC - killing Hartler - Yes, Hartler...
• Albert Einstein optical illusion - wait for it...

• The Injustice: Gods Among Us comic is the worst you will read this year - Worse than Cacophony and The Widening Gyre?
• Partygoing - new music from Future Bible Heroes
• Sopapilla Cheesecake Bars - brand recipes sometimes sound tasty

• Bob's Burger - "Topsy" - I'm thinking Sufjan Stevens has to be involved in this somehow.
• The evolution of King James - How LeBron changed his game to be far more efficient.
• XKCD 'Time' - There's brilliance here with each frame being released on the half hours.

• Zombie Nation "Whoa oh oh" - I'd been hunting down the song that the IU band plays as IU basketball games tip-off. Thanks to the IU Marching Hundred for telling me.

Cool, cool water...and music...

Songs, songs on the range from PHSChemGuy on 8tracks Radio.

We close out another 8tracks week with a litany of western songs.

Have a wee listen

A wee nip... from PHSChemGuy on 8tracks Radio.

In no way is this playlist an endorsement of drinking. It has, however, resulted in a bunch of spectacular songs.

Update: A Gag That Never Gets Old

At some point it's just too easy...(source)

Take off...

Hosers from PHSChemGuy on 8tracks Radio.

Canadian artists...turns out it was a repeat playlist, but I'm posting it anyway...

Today's random ten is brought to you by...

Tuesday random music club from PHSChemGuy on 8tracks Radio.

Today's ten random songs...

• "Girl From the North Country" by Dylan & Cash - This just might be my favorite song of all time. I love the reverence that Dylan shows to Cash throughout, particularly when Cash starts to sing the wrong verse. You can hear Dylan and Cash singing different words, and Dylan just slips right into Cash's choice. It's a beautiful song and a masterfully moving performance of it. Plus it's Dylan in his Nashville Skyline voice.
• "Little Tina" by Creedence Clearwater Revival - I wanted a couple of CCR tracks that weren't on the two Chronicles a few years back and mistakenly grabbed a six-disc boxed set of CCR. That's way more CCR than I have any interest in having around. Of course, all it costs me is electrons at this point, so I'm keeping them. This one's a'ight but nothing special
• "Ship of Fools" by Robert Plant - I'll put Plant's post-Zep career up against most anybody leaving an all-time great band. This song's nice and easy going and comes from a greatest hits disc, not from the original Now and Zen. That's an album that Calen and I got to hear nearly in its entirety a few weeks back at halftime of the PHS-Centerville game 
• "Sinaloa Cowboys" by Bruce Springsteen - The Ghost of Tom Joad is a haunting album, spare and bare of anything unnecessary. There isn't a lot of joy on the entire disc, and this one fits the theme. That being said, the album is one of Bruce's finest, filled to the brim with heatbreaking stories.
• "Snow Angel" by Ryan Adams - A couple of years back I went hunting some of Ryan Adams's unreleased songs and ended up torrenting four-hundred-plus tracks of his, many of which come from a collection marked as Rough and Mellow as does this one. It's a piano tune - more instrumental than song at times - that was played in Minneapolis in late 2000, right around the time of Heartbreaker. I've only made it through about half the full torrent. 
• "Spring Cleaning" by Bright Eyes/Neva Dinova - Connor Oberst is an interesting sort, a bit like Ryan Adams to me in that they're both outstanding songwriters who might be a little too prolific and unguided for their own good. This tune, sung with the band Neva Dinova on a joint release is pretty enough but nothing to write home about.
• "The Ballad of Cat Ballou" by Nat 'King' Cole and Stubby Kaye - Fun times, fun western staring Jane Fonda from long, long ago. The best part of the movie, though, might be the repeated appearances of these two as wandering minstrels both advancing the story and providing musical relief.
• "The Other Side of Town" by Steve Earle - The song sounds far older than its true age with Earle having included some record scratches in the mix. I like my Earle a little less twangy, but he's got this part of his oeuvre, and that's his business.
• "Born on the Bayou" by CCR (again) - Much better choice this time around from CCR. Weird that they would have two tracks in my random ten with 102 of my total 17450 tracks at home, but such is life. I think everybody knows this one.
• "Grandpa Was a Carpenter" by John Prine - I love John Prine's voice - at least I loved his voice before the neck cancer. This song about Prine's grandfather (I assume it's based on a real man) is loving and fun. The chorus, in particular, is loads of fun.

XKCD...again...

If you're not paying attention to xkcd, you're doing yourself a drastic disservice.

Today's comic is, again, a work of art...in which Randall is posting the slowest-updating animated-gif-style comic I've seen. Every half hour, apparently since midnight this morning, the comic updates to show the two main characters - cue ball and Megan - sitting by the side of a body of water, lying down, then Cue Ball waking down to dip a toe in the water. Some of the half-hourly updates have been slight movements of arms and legs; others have been larger movements of Cue Ball down to the shoreline.

It's amazing how expressive Randall manages to be while using only stick figures.

And it's amazing how dedicated and geeky his fans are...the xkcd forum thread for the individual comic...the explainxkcd post for the comic (though the site is being bombarded and is temporarily unavailable)...and a specific forum post showing each of the comics in order - and as an animated gif...

Randall, I shake your hand, sir...

The redcoats are singing...the redcoats are singing...

Limeys from PHSChemGuy on 8tracks Radio.

British artists...how have I not posted such a list before?

Survival...barely...

Had a blast at UDayton Arena today. Two very close games...

Much happier when it was OSU in trouble. I've nothing invested in them.

Terrified for most of the IU-Temple game, but IU survived...thankfully.

Even if the ship was somehow able to sneak through...

• The Dark Star Conspiracy - The tone is conspiracy-perfect and hilarious.
• Laser lit alcohol rocket bottles - I love bottle #6 at 0:52...and slow-mo fire.

This weekend's link post is a little YouTube-heavy, so I'll put the rest after the jump...

A new black and white revolution

This past Sunday morning - a lovely if a bit chilly Saint Patrick's Day morning - Calen and I headed down to the riverfront to help the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society at a Mini-Marathon water stop.

The water and Gatorade handing-out wasn't too tough, largely because we had ten or so volunteers to run the stop with us. We were, however, also supposed to have a band playing at our stop to help the runnners move along. After a late night at Bogart's though, the band had a bit of a lie in and didn't make it to the stop until there were only twenty or so walkers still to complete our section of the course.

Lucky for us, though, Zebras in Public - the aforementioned band was pretty good. Take a look and a listen...





In case you wanted to know what they were all about, here's their website's introduction...

The public is a conglomerate of different races, religions, nationalities and social backgrounds, but we all bleed and breathe the same. With three musicians that are white, a black bassist and lead singer,  Zebras in Public is a testament that the public is one. Four different men, four different musicians, and four different backgrounds.

There's more music over on their site. It's worth a listen...

Update: Harlan's new sister

The new girl, Clementine, has been a bit of a handful at times.

She's cost us a couple hundred dollars in new baby gates...

We can, at this point, heartily endorse Safety 1st's lift & lock safety gates.

She's also destroyed a couch pillow, three (I think) dog beds, two tennis balls, a wicker storage cube/basket thing (the tan one on the bottom shelf, second from the right has nibble marks and is without its matching neighbor that was next door)...

...a library DVD case (thankfully not the DVD itself), a dog electric blanket (shut up, we had an old dog who liked to be warm), pair of The Girl's slippers, and two kitchen towels. She's still well behind LeRoy's early time with us when he ate three pairs of glasses, numerous pants and sheets, and a heck of a lot more.

She is, however, wonderfully affectionate and fairly obedient (can sit, heel, stay, can kinda 'get down' - not so much with the lie down or the sit while out on a walk). She's mostly housebroken - though there have been a few accidents inside the house during the day - one non-solid but definitively poopy incident that inadvertently lead to the shattering of my cell phone.

All in all, she's been a good addition to the household.

Court briefs

It's my favorite time of the year: March Madness.

I spent a few hours this weekend watching basketball - wish it was more hours, but the Hoosiers took it on the chin against Wisconsin again. In the process I noticed two really pretty things...

First there's the Big Ten's logo for their basketball tournament. It was on the center of the United Center court, and it's just gorgeous...

It's pretty enough just on its own, but it's even better when you look at where the design originates. Each of the color flags represents one of the Big Ten's eleven(yeah, I know - there are twelve and it's still the Big Ten) schools. I'll run through which I think is which in clock order...

1. red & grey - Ohio State (or Wisconsin)
2. red & white - Indiana
3. purple & orange - Minnesota
4. red & dark grey/black - Wisconsin (or Ohio State)
5. purple & lighter purple - Northwestern
6. dark blue & light blue - Penn State (though I've never seen them in the light blue)
7. green & light green - Michigan State (again, haven't seen the light green)
8. gold & black - Purdue
9. yellow & blue - Michigan
10. yellow & black - Iowa
11. orange & blue - Illinois

Apparently Nebraska's addition a few years back didn't merit changing the logo. I'm curious as to whether Maryland & Rutgers will get any addition/change or not.

The other outstanding court design that I saw this weekend was the Mountain West's entire court design.

I'm not necessarily sold on the Reese's logos, but that's just for the money. I love, love, love the mountains along the bottom side of the court. 

In the whole-court design shown there, though, the true glory of the court doesn't quite shine through. The designs aren't painted on the court but are rather either inlaid or varnished in darker stains of wood as part of the court. Up close (at least up close on TV as I saw it), the design is just stunning. Check ESPN's photos of the UNLV-New Mexico conference championship game.

That's right up there with 'Put a tiger in your tank' and 'Where's the beef?'...

• Gorgeous photography of the elements - Do you really need me to tell you what this is?
• How not to get stuck next to someone who sucks - The language is a bit , but it's good advice.
• The miracle pine - It does make for some spectacular photos.

• New Hostess owners hope to get Twinkies on the shelves by this summer - I'll be first in line.
• Wikipedia lists - How else would you know all the fictional ducks?
• State of the Pun - I love puns, they're punny.

• Cornstarch - How much cornstarch can you pour down the drain before unpleasant things start to happen? Apparently things are a little slow in Fort Wayne.
• Brainteaser: Balloon on a Bus - This one's subtle.
• A fish by any other name - Great name...great mouth...

• An Illinois golfer fell into a sinkhole in the fairway, and thank God he has a blog - ...and we have pictures
• Looking forward to Batman's past - Ask Chris #145...shockingly about Batman
• Still searching for bodies two years after the tsunami in Japan - We need a good update 'cause it's been two years.

• Amazing water and sound experiment #2 - Seriously amazing...stunning...wow...
• Carbon taxes make Ireland even greener - See, it's funny and environmentally friendly.
• Fabian Oefner's Black Hole - pretty pictures
• And now, Vlade Divac, as Abraham Lincoln - just because...

I'm like a dead tree...

It's been a weird week around PHS, the week when we give the state-mandated Ohio Graduation Tests to our sophomores (and any juniors and seniors who still need to pass). That means I've spent the first two-and-a-half hours of each day in my classroom watching students silently test - or sigh - or put their heads down. It's helpful (because I can get some work done), frustrating (I'm not free to come and go, and I have to be nearly silent), boring (really, two and a half hours of near silence), and tense (the tests are high-stakes for both the students and the staff).

Luckily, my co-proctor, Dennis Simpson, yesterday gave me an interesting bit of trivia before we began the test. Dennis mentioned that at one time, a movie was filmed at Princeton High School. He said it was more of a made-for-tv movie, but that it was a legitimate feature-length production. He could remember the approximate title: The Spider's Web or Spider Web. He had a vague memory of a few scenes: a flying car landed in the PHS gymnasium, students visited a 'nearby' quarry (actually filmed in Bedford, Indiana), and someone drawing a diagram on a chalkboard and explaining the interconnectedness of all things, as in the titular spider's web. And he also knew the director, Scott Wegener, then a cameraman at local WCPO and now a reporter at the same station. Dennis said he has been looking for a copy of The Spider's Web for years and that he had initially videotaped it when it was first broadcast (oddly before he came to teach at PHS) but had long ago lost his copy of the cassette.

I, being the bored teacher that I was - and with third quarter grades having been turned in the evening before - went a hunting via the web. I had no luck at IMBD, finding lots of other movies with very similar titles but not this one. Amazon and ebay were both strikeouts, too. YouTube didn't provide anything other than videos of spider webs in Cincinnati or filmed by someone named either Scott or Wegener. In fact, the only mentions of the production that I could find on the web were listed along with Scott Wegener and even then just in passing as one of his previous projects (adding that it was filmed in 1995). I did find his production company, on whose website I found the only production still (see above) and most in-depth plot summary that I have managed to locate.

Two high school students competing in a state science fair improve on Einstein’s Theory of Relativity. Stars Nick Arrom, Adam Winston

In a semi-desperate attempt, I sent Mr Wegener an email at his WCPO account (I oddly couldn't find any contact information on his production company's website) asking if he had or knew where I could purchase a copy.


Anybody know where I can find copies of twenty-year-old, locally-produced, probably never distributed, after-school-special-type 'movies'?

I would love to find a copy of this video (ideally on DVD or digital file) out there but am currently, as the post title suggests, stumped.

Your source for all your pope-related news...

Two quick things...

One, the new pope has a chemistry major...

And B, the Vatican has finally released their recipe for white and black smoke. The BBC does a nice job explaining the chemistry behind each mixture. They also have a great photo of the black smoke from yesterday morning.

Tune in for more breaking pope news as it happens.

Thank you, Wikipedia

I love that Wikipedia has an article on the Five-Timers Club among its bizillion article.



Personally, I don't think that Paul Simon qualifies since he's only hosted four times, but he has appeared as an official member of the Five-Timers Club on Saturday Night Live at least twice...

Update: The buying spree beckons

One dam has broken in the eminent buying spree.

Last Thursday was a rough day - hectic at work with the end of the quarter sending seemingly every student to me needing just one more thing followed by coming home to destruction (a library DVD, a shattered ceramic bowl, poop, pee) from the new dog. As I found the filth, I had my older flip phone in my hand, and I'm not proud to say that I yelled a vulgarity and spiked the phone onto our tile floor. It's the second time in about five or six years that I've broken my phone in frustration. The other time saw me hurl a phone into our patio doors (thankfully no damage to the glass doors that time.)

This left me without a working phone, vastly accelerating the purchase of a new phone. The need left me either diving directly into smartphone territory or choosing to forgo a smartphone for another two years, until the new contract would be up and I would be eligible for a new phone.

...and if I was getting a smartphone, by golly The Girl was getting a smartphone. So we are now smartphone people with Otterboxes on the way from Amazon to protect the new investments.

I'm the sheepish owner of a Samsung Galaxy S2 Epic Touch (sheesh, the names)...

...and The Girl is the proud owner of a Samsung Galaxy S3...

Of course because I spiked my phone and couldn't get it to turn on anymore, I lost all my old contacts.

Thanks to The Girl and Calen, I was able to enter most of them, but if you think I'm supposed to have your phone number, send me a text with your name, would ya, please?

And, what apps are must-have for an Android platform?

Now I just need to make sure I don't spike this one.

New favorite

Jennifer Lawrence is attractive and a great actress (see especially Winters Bone) and crass.

She's swiftly becoming a new favorite.

There are a bunch of nice animated gifs over on Uproxx...and Uproxx...

I warn you, there's a pic after the jump that's ...

And I won't tell you how I got the hairy knuckles, either...

• The shadow of surface tension - Holy crap...I love science...and photography...
• Minimalist typography posters of scientists - I don't get the Tesla one. Any help?
• Beach Wars - Gidget goes galactic.

• Movie Trailer Parody of the Day: Average Party - I'm glad this guy survived the Shark Pool.
• Gourmet apples - Man, I have got to find myself some Japanese apples.
• The rising cost of special education - The full article is fascinating and again part of the 'problems with education are too big to solve'.

• Top Secret Drum Corps - The electronic stuff at the end is meh, but the rest is pretty cool.
• The concrete saucer of Mount Buzludzha - Communist architecture at its most impressive.
• Special effects in Labyrinth - Lucky David Bowie didn't up-chuck

• Community: then and now - Some people are a little too invested, but there is something to this.
• Floor plan drawings - Some of those apartments are HUGE.
• Gollum sings 'Mad World' - A very, very...sad world.

• A day in the life of a freelance journalist - What you got you got to give it to your magazine...for free.
• The great folk rock revival - The article's not much, but the playlist's not bad.

• Former Cowboys Cheerleader... - PA Josh is former PHS student. I didn't teach him, but he was a P4P all-star.
• Terrible Karate - Everybody is kung fake fighting...

• How did you take that picture? - The fingers are freaky...the other photos are entertaining...
• Whiz kids - Stevens must have been at Depauw when I was at Wabash. I'm guessing I booed him. I kinda wanna go see a VCU game now, just because of this...(and kinda this)

• Identify this young dancer - I can identify him. Can you?
• Ice balloons - I love that these happened by accident.
• Electric fence experiment ends as expected - Yes, it does.

• The Sporting Statues project - Eight in Cincinnati...love 'em...
• The myth of 'peak oil' - I hope this is true, but I still want us to pursue alternatives.
• Time-lapse video of Alice Finch assembling Lego Hogwarts - The most recent best Lego project ever.

• Ex-X: the noble tradition of rage quitting the X-Men - Where's Kitty?
• Season Two Henchwomen - I love, Love, LOVE that there is minutia like this on the web.
• Witness the power and importance of the Stedicam - Love the tracking shots.

Look to the heavens

I'm a very, very casual skywatcher.

This year seems to be a good time for people like me.

There are going to be two comets to check out in the skies, one of which (Ison) may just end up being visible to the naked eye during the day.

As always, there are a bunch of meteor showers and other interesting astronomical events of the year, too.

Songs for a snowy day

Songs for a snowy day from PHSChemGuy on 8tracks Radio.

Here's to a happy snow day (assuming we actually get one)...

Edit: Finally...a snow day...first in two years...we'd better have one after a local weatherman posted this last night...

"Model run just coming in shows West Chester, Loveland, Forest Park, Fairfield and Hamilton along with surrounding communities getting 11" or more of snow tonight - more soon -SteveH"

Top Five: 50-50

The Girl and I caught 50-50 over the weekend. Good film - not perfect but good. Let's check where it ranks among the various films of the various actors.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt

1. Dark Knight Rises
2. Looper
3. Brick
4. (500) Days of Summer
5. 50/50

Seth Rogan

1. Superbad
2. 50/50
3. Fight for Your Right (revisited) 
4. Knocked Up
5. 40 Year Old Virgin

Anna Kendrick

1. Scott Pilgrim vs the World
2. Pitch Perfect
3. Up in the Air
4. 50/50
5. Rocket Science

Anjelica Houston

1. The Royal Tenenbaums
2. 50/50
3. Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou
4. The Grifters
5. The Addams Family

Phillip Baker Hall

1. The Truman Show
2. "Seinfeld" (Mr Bookman)
3. 50/50
4. Dogville
5. In Good Company

Series Ten Revealed

Lego has released an image of their tenth series of collectible minifigures.

This set will be seventeen figures instead of sixteen, with the seventeenth being a gold figure (in the back right) being produced in very, very limited numbers, only 5000 of them in the world.

Release date is alleged to be April or May, so I've got until then before I'm back in the Kenwood Lego store.

A wetting contract provokes the half irony.

• Hands-free deer rescue - That's nice...and creative
• Extra credit - Interesting work around for a someone younger than 35 to become US president legally.
• Comic Rack - New Batman Incorporated 8 - I appreciate the first sentence 'I"m about as far as you can get from a Grant Morrison fan.' Me, too.

• The Big Whobowski - One I'm really familiar with, one less so, but I abide.
• Intricate pencil sculptures - stunning...especially the chain
• The rise and fall of music delivery formats - good animated gif showing the changes over time...2002 was impressive
• Might as well - chilling photo...assumedly not photoshopped

• Artsy Fart of the Day - I could watch this for hours
• Girlfriend leads photographer around the world - Great photo series...pretty girl and neat idea...wonderful color saturation
• New Adidas NCAA tourney uniforms are definitely something - Two of the teams shown might not make the tourney. I like Baylor and Notre Dame's unis there, though.

• Circular beam of electrons - so pretty
• Chocolate dipped peanut butter cup stuffed Oreos - yes, please
• F in exams - I wish I got chuckles like this from my tests.

• Bubbles popping in slow motion - slow motion anything, yes, please...
• Link roundup - A scary theory about the woman found dead in an LA hotel water tank.
• Benoit Paille - Pretty photos

• Oreos without cream and with laughs - Why would he take away the best part?
• Helium? I Barely Knew 'um! - Here's a bit of explanation about the coming helium shortage in comic form.
• The Civil War, now in living color - impressive work
• Aqua Regia - You could do worse in learning chemistry than to watch all of this group's videos.

• Top Shelf announces Jess Fink's We Can Fix It: a time travel memoir - I'll give that a try,
• The most depressing Funky Winkerbean strips from February - as always, there are a bunch
• Tacet- a Shakespearean mystery, anybody have any ideas...Lakes?
• For Sale: Nobel Prize - Interesting in lots of ways - self censorship, the final story, and how many prizes have gone missing