Alex Santoso's Blog Posts
In the hands (and mouth) of Buddy Greene, the lowly harmonica is transformed into a fearsome musical instrument.
How good is he? Let's say that they don't let anyone just play at the Carnegie Hall. With a harmonica, no less. Harmonica! Think about it: Link [embedded YouTube clip]
Photo: Elizabeth Thomsen [Flickr]
That's "I See What You Mean," a 40-foot tall blue bear peering into the window of the Colorado Convention Center. The steel and fiberglass sculpture is created by Lawrence Argent:
The artist has described I See What You Mean as a stylized representation of native fauna. As the bear peeks inside the enormous facility at the conventioneers, displacement and wonder pique curiosity and question a greater relationship of art, technology and whimsy.
Link - via Pursuits: Elizabeth Thomsen and Super Punch
My hat is off to the folks at Bandai - the Japanese toymaker has created a speaker with a diorama of Tokyo's Ginza district, back in the days (like 1955, dudes). Behold, the Bandai Diorama Speaker:
The 2×1W speaker comes with moving parts, sound effects and a bunch of LED lights. Only 2000 copies have been made and the price is ¥198,000 (about $2,200 USD).
Link - via GeekAlerts
Finally. After years of being an internet meme, the Lolcats have their own theme song. And like a bad car wreck on the freeway, there's just NO WAY you can not look at it.
I dare you: Link (with apologies to The Cure)
According to a new poll by Pew Research Center, more than half of Americans want to live somewhere else than they're currently living:
Living in Las Vegas appeals more to men than women. Affluent adults are twice as likely as poorer folks to want to live in Boston. Young people like big cities such as New York and Los Angeles. More Americans would rather live in a place with more McDonald's than one with more Starbucks.
Those are some of the findings of a Pew Research Center survey out today on where Americans would most like to live. Whether they favor cities, suburbs or the countryside, almost half wish they lived somewhere else, the report found. City dwellers are more likely to dream of living somewhere else, and men in rural areas are far happier living there than women.
"There are some more fundamental differences between men and women," says Rich Morin, senior editor of the Pew Research Center survey. "Different cities seem to appeal to different partisan ideological groups. … People who are drawn to cities are typically younger people."
Denver, San Diego and Seattle are the top picks of the 30 largest metropolitan areas. Denver is the favorite city among Republicans, and it also rates well with Democrats and independents.
Link - via The Zeray Gazette
So far, I've lived in 2 different countries and 5 different places, the latest of which is good ol' Southern California ... and I can't wait to move away!
How about you? Where would you rather live and why?
Plenty of Hollywood marriages are so short that they're over before the ink on the marriage certificates dry (Britney Spears and Jason Alexander's 55 hours marriage, anyone?). But it doesn't mean that all celebrities weddings are destined not to last.
Here are 10 famous couples that are married to each other, like, forever (Yes, though in some cases, it's their second marriage). Take for instance, Charlton Heston and Lydia Clarke's 64 years of marriage:
Charlton married Lydia, a student at Northwestern, in 1944. She thought he was arrogant and full of himself; he loved her “tumbling mane of black Irish hair.” He paid $12 for her wedding ring and they got married spontaneously after he convinced her to before he was sent overseas with the Air Corps. They had a son and a daughter together.
Link - via i met a possum
The Cairns Post reported this incredible story of a cow that is believed to have survived a lightning strike:
In a moo-ving experience, this cow is believed to have been struck by lightning and somehow survived.
This is no mad cow story. It's entirely feasible, according to JCU Professor of Geo-Sciences, Jon Nott.
"Cows are susceptible to lightning strikes because of both sets of legs being on the ground, and they're eating grass from where electricity is conducted from the strike so it is possible it happened but, more often than not, cows die from it," Prof Nott said.
Link - via Neatorama Forum, posted by liviaL
Armando Lee of the Astronomical League of the Philippines, F. Naelga Jr., and 100 Hours of Astronomy took this fantastic photo of a partial eclipse of the Sun over Manila Bay, which was showcased on APOD. I couldn't resist putting on the obvious googly eyes ... Come on, you know you're thinking it too!
We posted about the surprising news that the octuplets' mother already having 6 children. Today, more disturbing details are emerging about the woman:
The woman who gave birth to octuplets this week conceived all 14 of her children through in vitro fertilization, is not married and has been obsessed with having children since she was a teenager, her mother said. [...]
Little psychological research has been conducted on the reasons some mothers seem hooked on repeated pregnancies. David Diamond, a co-director for the Center for Reproductive Psychology in San Diego, said mothers can be drawn to repeat pregnancies for a number of reasons, with some finding the experience so satisfying they choose to become surrogates.
Diane G. Sanford, a psychologist and author specializing in women's reproductive mental health, said while she doesn't know much about Nadya Suleman's background, women that have obsessive-compulsive disorder can become fixated on different obsessions.
"Her obsession centers around children, having children and being a mother," she said. "To what degree are her esteem and identity based on being a mom and why has this from a young age been such a preoccupation of hers?"
So, the first month of 2009 is almost over and it seems that so far the new year has been nothing but bad economic news after bad economic news.
Last week, the folks at the US watched as big companies cut more than 100,000 jobs (with over 70,000 jobs lost on Monday alone), the stock market tumbled, and home prices continued its freefall. Congress played politics over the stimulus package (it passed the House strictly on party line votes) and - surprise - Wall Street continued giving billions in bonuses and perks ($87,784 for a rug, anyone?)
And you know the economy is bad when more people are searching Google for coupons than Britney Spears (via Bo Cowgill).
How's 2009 been treating you? Did you lose your job? Have trouble making ends meet? What do you think needs to be done to fix the economy? Can the economy be fixed? I'd love to hear from you.
Senator Claire McCaskill is angry at the Wall Street "idiots" who are giving out $18 billion in bonuses in 2008. So angry that she has just introduced a bill to cap their pay:
An angry U.S. senator introduced legislation Friday to cap compensation for employees of any company that accepts federal bailout money.
Under the terms of a bill introduced by Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Missouri, no employee would be allowed to make more than the president of the United States. Obama's current annual salary is $400,000.
"We have a bunch of idiots on Wall Street that are kicking sand in the face of the American taxpayer," an enraged McCaskill said on the floor of the Senate. "They don't get it. These people are idiots. You can't use taxpayer money to pay out $18 billion in bonuses."
McCaskill's proposed compensation limit would cover salaries, bonuses and stock options.
Who thinks it's a darned good idea?
Forget the Year of the Ox, according to Bruce Sterling of Seed Magazine, 2009 is the Year of the Panic. He lists 7 reasons why; for example, let's take look at insurance:
4. Insurance and building codes. Every year, insurance rates soar from mounting "natural" catastrophes, obscuring the fact that the planet's coasts are increasingly uninsurable.
Insurance underlies the building and construction trades. If those rates skyrocket, that system must keel over. Once people lose faith in the institution of insurance?—?because insurance can't be made to pay in climate-crisis conditions?—?we'll find ourselves living in a Planet of Slums.
Most people in this world have no insurance and ignore building codes. They live in "informal architecture," i.e., slum structures. Barrios. Favelas. Squats. Overcrowded districts of this world that look like a post-Katrina situation all the time. When people are thrown out of their too-expensive, too-coded homes, this is where they will go.
Unless they're American, in which case they'll live in their cars.
But how can dispossessed Americans pay for their car insurance when they have no fixed address? Besides, car companies are coming apart with the sudden savage ease of Enron's collapse. Indeed, the year 2009 is shaping up as a planetary Enron. Enron was always the Banquo's ghost at the banquet of Bushonomics. The moguls of Enron really were the princes of contemporary business innovation, and the harbingers of the present day.
A police officer in Brisbane, Australia, got into hot water for trying to claim ... free donuts from a local Krispy Kreme:
A Brisbane police officer got into a holey row with Krispy Kreme staff, demanding to be served free doughnuts.
Shocked customers looked on as the officer argued with staff for several minutes in a bid to get his freebies, before finally storming off - empty handed and non-cinnamon-fingered. [...]
As the icing on the cake, Krispy Kreme has now decided to stop supplying Brisbane police with leftover doughnuts.
Turns out, it was a simple misunderstanding:
Before the incident, officers had been regularly popping in to collect free boxes of leftover doughnuts at the store in nearby Albert St at the end of the day. Staff were unable to sell the doughnuts and were only too happy to oblige.
A police source said the officer had become confused and thought the free doughnut arrangement applied at all times. "Everyone's a bit annoyed because they were a nice treat at the end of the day with a coffee," he said.
http://www.news.com.au/story/0,27574,24988152-29277,00.html
What's up with Google? Has anyone else seen this? Every single search I do on Google now returns "This site may harm your computer," even when I search for ... Google!
Update: Seems like this bug was fixed already! Phew!
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