For one thing, I don’t have to emigrate.
There are whoops and whooshes across New York.
This city clearly knows how it wants to vote.
It’s not as loud as the Superbowl though (but I think that’s because of the rolling commitment by the TV stations).
Congratulations, America. Well done!
I can’t vote, I’m so forrin and stupid. But I can certainly remind you Americans to vote.
And actually, I’m going to remind you to vote for Obama.
Vetos are just Community Chest cards for the White House.
P.S. CNN is about to put you, the readers, questions to Joe the Plumber. Can you believe it? Oh shit, where exactly *are* their studios, because I need to know where they live?
Why can’t R.E.M. write songs like this any more?
And what’s this video about? 1985 + R.E.M. = Video Budget: $25?
When I read “meta YouTube video art” my first reaction was “sigh”.
But this is some fun and clever stuff. Check out the very last one if you don’t watch any others.
(via kottke)
Wow.
Thanks, TSF.
This is a classic!
I just watched my first 15 minutes of Formula 1 in probably about 5 years. I used to watch it a lot. I used to love it. My cousin is a seriously addicted lover of Formula 1.
Before I get into why I’m even writing about it, take a look at the car above. I’ve been watching for years. I’m always amazed by the evolution of the car. It’s almost organic now, like an H.R. Geiger work. The curves and extensions and wings and nozzles. Fluid dynamics gone wild. Brilliant. But why do I even care?
I think I’ve just watched the best 15 minutes of motorsport I’ve ever seen. It’s one of the most incredible 15 minutes of any sport I’ve ever seen.
Sport never ceases to do this. Tennis finals, this race. Incredible. Let me put it in context:
The leader of the race (Masa) would have won the world championship on his home racetrack (Brazil) if the championship leader (Hamilton) came lower than 5th place.
4 laps left. Hamilton was in 5th. The rain started very lightly. With 3 laps left he changed tyres to rain tyres and came out of the change in 5th place. 6th place (Vettel) did the same at the same time. Rain carried on. The guy in 4th (Glock) stayed in dry tyres and stayed in 4th.
With 2 laps left, Hamilton was overtaken by Vettel, a guy who’s apparently great in the rain. Soon, with less than 1 lap (out of 71) left, Hamilton was in 6th, Masa in 1st.
This would leave Masa winning the championship, Hamilton dropping to second.
But the rain got heavier, and Vettel was pulling away from Hamilton on every corner. Hamilton needed that 5th place, but with Vettel there it seemed imposible.
It looked over. Masa was over the finish line already. Something had to happen in the next 12 seconds or so. Ferrarri were celebrating, Masa was cruising on his (race) victory lap, getting updates from the pits. They had won the race, the constructor’s chamionship, and surely Masa had won the driver’s championship.
On the last corner, with the heavier rain and on his dry tyres Glock dropped from 4th to 6th, putting Vettel in 4th and Hamilton into 5th. Hamilton wins the drivers championship by 1 point (98 to 97).
Put another way, a billion dollar annual competition with technology innovation that leads the world, raced over thousands of miles at breakneck speeds (with left and right turns) in all weather and all over the world, between tens of drivers and a clutch of manufacturers all under incredible scrutiny and carefully defined rules with each race lasting about an hour and a half comes down to the last 15 seconds on the last corner of the last race, after the race leader has already finished.
Incredible.
My dear dear chum Aaron is running in the New York marathon today. If he makes it in under 3 hours, I owe another 26 bucks to some needy kids somewhere…
His first half was 1:27:09. He’s slowing very slightly. Here are his 5k times so far…
Honestly, to me, that seems a pretty good rate of decline. If he can keep that up, I’ll be a bit poorer in a couple of hours. If I know Aaron, he’s got some crazy monkey shit stored away for a last sprint.
Ah, the future, being able to track your freak friends through some massive ordeal, live.
Update: With that spurt between 25k and 30k, he looks on track to hit just under 3 hours. I predict 2:57! Go Aaron, go!
Update 2: Finished. 2:58:35! Great stuff!
Wow.
That’s 30cm of hail in 2 hours.
Not in the Mid-West. Not in Siberia. In Devon, England. Those cows will be terrified and the cream’s going to be awful for the next few months.
Have I mentioned it already? You MUST see Mad Men.
Kottke got obsessed with it a while back. The DMC has had us watching it since day one. I’m sceptical about these things, and something of a cynic (has anyone noticed how on almost a minute-by-minute basis the writers of Heroes appear to be losing brainpower - they’re at the equivalent of a 5 year old writer’s ability right now - I think I’m not even going to bother with the season finale), but I do like Mad Men even if (as TSF has pointed out) it’s getting a bit soap-operaesque.
This opening bodes well for another program that’s in a tremendous funk right now: The Simpsons. Their Halloween specials are usually a highlight. I have hopes for this one.
5 days late, my apologies.
5 days in any prison for someone innocent is 5 days too many. I must assume that an Iranian prison is up there on the unpleasantness scale.
Ah, the sweet misinformed idealism of youth…
“Personhood” being bestowed upon a foetus at conception might very well sound like a catch-all solution to the debate of when a foetus is too advanced to abort (which is really what the “anti-abortion” debate is all about once you exclude the issue of rape). But aside from all the reservations from both sides of the abortion argument, there’s the very real possibility that if someone miscarries that a possible murder investigation could ensue.
As someone who’s known a few people who have miscarried, that’s as frightening as charging people for a rape kit. But as we all know, the law is an ass.
Incidentally, lawmakers and the media make the argument for the exception to anti-abortion rules being “rape or incest”. Why? Not that I personally condone incest but incest without rape does exist: all of a sudden there you go imposing not a right-to-life issue, but a moral doctrine. And if you’re anti-abortion you have no right to counter that with the issue of inbreeding and disability because you’re already arguing against the termination after 20 weeks of demonstrably disabled foetuses. If your argument is that rape is illegal and incest is illegal, then what if the mother is 18 but the father is 40 in a state that doesn’t allow sex like that? Oh, the sweet idealism of youth.
I just hope I never see a headline that reads “Death Row woman maintains miscarriage story”.