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The 2011 holiday season is obviously over, and I’m sure most of you have already put away your decorations and chucked out your tree, ready to start a new year full of whatever 2012 has in store. But wait, there’s one more present waiting for you under the tree on the interwebs, and it’s called Mega Man’s Christmas Carol Part 2!
Brought to you by the good people at Sprites Inc., this fun retro styled game casts Doctor Wily as a Scroogey sort of fellow hell bent on ruining Christmas for Mega Man and his posse. And the best part is- you can download it for FREE!
So sit back, stretch your fingers, and bring that holiday cheer back one last time!
Link –via Destructoid
If you watch Arrested Development, then you know there’s always money in the Banana Stand, which is why this is such a great gift for any fan of the show.
This great picture of Lucas Arts’ holiday card from this year made me wish I was on their Christmas card list. This particular card was sent to Bonnie Burton, the editor of The Official Star Wars Blog.
Image Via Laughing Squid
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If you thought your Christmas tree was outlandish this year, take a gander at these wild and wacky trees, created by some of the world’s top fashion designers.
There are trees designed by Gaultier (pictured above), Vuitton, Chanel, Trussardi and Christian Dior, among other fabulous fashion moguls.
They take conventional and turn it upside down, creating some of the most artistic and innovative designs for what is normally just another tree adorned with ornaments and lights. Check out the other 15 fab trees at the Flavorwire link below, before the trees get taken down for the new year.
The Polish city of Kraków has a rich tradition of building fanciful and elaborate Nativity sets, known in Polish as szopki, that dates back to the arrival of Franciscan friars in the city in the Thirteenth Century. These have become tremendously popular and a cultivated craft:
To bring in a national color, historical figures from local legends were added to the scenes. Many other Biblical figures like King Herod and the Holy Family started making appearances too. By the eighteenth century, the figures had become movable, with stick puppets and string marionettes being introduced. While all this was taking place at Church, the excitement had gotten out of hand as decided by the Bishop Teodor Czartoryski, who banned the plays from churches in 1736. Only immobile scenes were permitted in church, the live puppet shows being passed down to the people. This was the beginning of the szopka as it is known today.
Some szopki are six feet tall! View several more pictures of them at the link.
Link | Photo: Lukasz Zoladz
Comments Off This Christmas, give you fellow priests a present they won’t soon forget: a smack to the face with brooms!
That’s what about some priests did while preparing Bethlehem’s Church of the Nativity for Orthodox Christmas on January 7:
The outburst, broken up by baton and shield-wielding Palestinian police, came to head as the Greek Orthodox and Armenian clerics, who each control a portion of the church along with Roman Catholics got into the scuffle over a ‘turf war.’ The Church of Nativity is believed to be built over the cave that marks the birthplace of Jesus.
Bethlehem police Lt-Col Khaled al-Tamimi was quoted in Reuters as saying that no one was arrested “because all those involved were men of God” while the BBC reported that the 1,700-year-old church is in bad shape because priests can’t agree on who should be footing the bill for its repair.
Oh, what joy to spend Christmas at the Addams Family house, hanging out braiding tinsel into Cousin Itt’s hair, and trying not to get blown up by Pugsley and Wednesday when they open their new presents. I wonder what the Addams Family does to carolers that appear on their doorstep?
What
happened when you toss a hopelessly tangled string of Christmas tree lights
to the recycling bin?
Chances are, if it escapes being put in a landfill, it will end up in Shijao, China, where 20 million pounds of Christmas lights go to die every year:
Adam Minter wrote this enlightening piece for The Atlantic: LinkShijiao, like most of China's recycling zones, began to thrive 20 years ago in part because of its cheap labor and low environmental standards. Even two years ago, visitors to the fields around town would see clouds of black smoke churning off giant piles of burning wire (not just Christmas tree wire), the fastest -- though by no means the cleanest -- way to extract copper from plastic and rubber. But something interesting happened on the road to globalization: China's manufacturers, hungry for cheap raw materials, developed an appetite for the recovered insulation that wraps around insulated copper wire, and devised a way to make into a range of products including, Li tells me, slipper soles.
Illustrator Becca Whitaker has just finished her Geek’s 12 Days Of Christmas, a series in which she released one illustration a day for the last twelve days on her blog, and I love the image she chose to end the series!
These adorable illustrations would make a great coloring book, maybe something to think about for next year Becca? You can see the rest of the illustrations in the series at her site Becca’s Bombshells, where there is no shortage of geek love.
Link –via DesignTAXI
John already shared a Portal Christmas tree with you guys, but this Portal wrapping job is equally amazing. While this is a really cool way to wrap a present, it seems weird to buy two copies of the same game just to wrap something more creatively.
Link Via Geeks Are Sexy
Well, of course. Did you think that he was going to use an alphorn? Those things take up too much room in a sleigh.
The tune becomes more recognizable about halfway through the video.
-via View from North Central Idaho
The floating heads of the Koren Ensemble (featured previously) perform selections from The Nutcracker by Tchaikovsky. -Thanks, Daniel Koren!
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Why do we take a parasitic weed, one that is rather difficult to gather, and hang it in the house so people can kiss underneath? That’s a rather weird tradition when you think abut it. Smithsonian tells several old tales of why we do this, but the real story of how mistletoe evolved from sandalwood into what it is now is the more interesting tale.
Before there were forests, wispy plants fell on each other in their struggle to reach the sun, like clumsy teenagers unsure of their growing bodies. Then one plant evolved a simple woody stem. It could grow taller than the other plants, and it stole light from them. It poisoned them with shade. Wars ensued that have lasted hundreds of millions of years. Trees of many kinds arose and struggled with each other to be taller. Any species that does not participate in battle loses out in the darkness of the understory—any species except a few. Those in the clan of the sandalwood evolved a way out of the darkness. They survived by stealing from the trees what they had spent their tall stems fighting for.
Sandalwood discovered deceit. Its roots kissed the roots of trees and slipped inside them to steal. But sandalwood still needed to grow up a little and put out a few green leaves to have enough sugar to thrive. And then came mistletoes. Mistletoe is a common name for several independent lineages descended from sandalwood. Like their ancestors, mistletoe species sink their roots into trees. Unlike those ancestors, they do so in the sky.
The story continues to explain how mistletoe developed its way of reproducing in the treetops. Link
(Image credit: Flickr user Darwin Bell)
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This custom Christmas card was sent out by escape artist, illusionist, and debunker Harry Houdini around 1920 or so. There’s another of his cards at Letters of Note. Link
(Image source: Houdini Himself)
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In a rare column, Santa Claus shares some correspondence containing some of the more difficult questions he’s received. His answers will make you think. For example, Darnell asked why he didn’t get the Atari he asked for in 1981.
No question, Atari would have been a great gift for you in 1981. I did get you a skateboard. As you skated around your neighborhood that spring you met your best friend for life, Victor. You ran over the girl you’d eventually bring to your senior prom, Dominique. If you’d spent all that time indoors playing Atari, maybe your life wouldn’t have taken these turns. Sometimes I’m not able to give children the gift they want, but I can give them a gift they’ll use and enjoy that is maybe the perfect gift for them at that moment. Part of believing in the spirit of the Holidays is trusting in that spirit.
Read more at The Hairpin. Link
Comments Off Zach Braff and Donald Faison from the TV show Scrubs recorded a Christmas song and uploaded it to YouTube this morning as a Christmas greeting. -via reddit
Four-year-old Dominic McCracken-Bruce and his 2-year-old brother Tyson only asked for one thing for Christmas -their Mommy. Army Reserve Capt. Dawn McCracken-Bruce was deployed to Iraq and Kuwait for the past nine months. When she came home for the holidays, she and her husband decided to surprise the boys during their visit with Santa Claus at the Mall at Robinson in Pittsburgh. See the video at WTAE. Link -via Fark
Yesterday, I posted Anthony Bordain’s great Krampus Carol and now for those of you who want a terrifying reminder of the evil Christmas character inside your own home, you can always look to this great doll from Shove Mink of Croshame. While the link doesn’t have any directions to make your own, the pictures can still provide you with a good starting point if you’re already a skilled crocheter.
Link Via Laughing Squid
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If you love Christmas animations, but start to feel like they’re a little too old and cliched, here’s the real reason why intrepid animators never update them to fit in with modern times.
Link Via Laughing Squid
If you’re one of the many people who has become obsessed with Skyrim, but your wife keeps insisting that you put up the Christmas lights, what do you do? Why make Skyrim-themed lights of course!
Via BuzzFeed
In honor of all of the great action movies that take place on Christmas, 39 Degrees brings you Gundog, the greatest action movie animal of all time.
Via BuzzFeed
Image: Donna Stolz/University of Pittsburgh/Nikon Small World
What better way to say Merry Christmas than with this fantastic wreath made from collage images of mammalian cells by biologist Donna Beer Stolz (what wonderful middle name!) of University of Pittsburgh? She won 19th place at the 2011 Nikon Small World Photomicrography Competition.
Previously on Neatorama: Lives Within a Drop of Water and Making the Ordinary, Extraordinary (images from the Nikon Small World)
Will Santa be confused by where to put the presents? No.
Kudos to Ryan Kelly, Jason Roberts and Chris Schuster, the brilliant crafters responsible for this Christmas tree.
-via Super Punch
UPDATE 12/25/11: Ryan emailed me with more information and pictures. You can find them below the jump.
Mike Maihack of Cow Shell Graphics drew this fabulous Christmas comic featuring Batgirl and Supergirl's plan to bring holiday festivities to crime fighting. Love the pom-poms on Batgirls' ears! Link - via Nerd Approved
So that’s how the big guy in the red suit delivers all those toys in one night! I wonder if he happens to be friends with a Time Lord, and what other tricks does he have up his sleeve, say for those on his naughty list? The world may never know…
Here’s a silly little animated short for all you Team Fortress fans out there, starring everyone’s favorite firebug Rudolph! Watch as he tries to burn the competition, and sing along as he is admonished for being such a useless class! Merry multiplayer mayhem to all, and to all a good fight!
–via Ology
Comments Off Sometimes great ideas go terribly wrong, especially when it comes to Christmas specials. For some reason, people tend to drop the ball when writing these holiday specials, and the results are hilariously bad.
While I disagree with the Rankin Bass specials being on this list, I will be the first to admit that they are a bit hokey by today’s standards, but I have a special place in my heart for all things stop motion so meh.
The rest of the specials definitely belong on this list, and some of them are so bad they serve to dampen my Christmas spirit, like the Larry The Cable Guy travesty above. Watch them with good humor, and wonder just what they were thinking when they made these stinkers!
–via ToplessRobot
Comments Off Ben Lean recorded these scenes in Toronto December 16-18 and presents the shopping frenzy in time-lapse for your enjoyment. Aren’t you glad you’re through with Christmas shopping? What -you aren’t? Ha! -via Nag on the Lake
Comments Off The flagpole scene from the movie A Christmas Story is recreated by hotdogs! Don’t miss the surprise ending. -via The Daily What
Comments Off You may recall Teddy’s earlier video where he eats corn, but here he is getting into the holiday spirit with a delicious Christmas cookie.
