Newbe asks, “What Is Steampunk to You?” I know that steampunk is “a subgenre of fantasy and speculative fiction” and I have read one such novel, The Difference Engine by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling. I didn’t much care for it and haven’t gotten around to reading any others. When I think of steampunk I [...]

Antique French postcards – the site is in French but even if you can’t read it it’s fun to look. Click on “Themes favoris” in the sidebar to see more. The cards open in a pop-up and then you can roll over the image to magnify parts of it. Mostly scenic but there are some [...]

I think I might have linked to one or two of these before but I’m not sure. Stuff like that starts to happen when you’re my age. Dear Jane Sample – about working in advertising Godammit I’m Mad – not as much anger as you might expect with a title like that; a lot of [...]

On the internet you can always find someone who has even more time on their hands than you. — here Not to be outdone, Quentin Tarantino is reportedly updating a 1960s Disney caper flick, and will be asking original stars Hayley Mills and Dean Jones to do cameos. Working title is That F***ing Cat. — [...]

I like these chess pieces Hottest to Coldest – world capitols arranged according to current temperature. (via Grow-a-Brain) Strange futuristic designs – cars, aircraft and trains The Campaign for Drawing Natural Collection – Earth friendly products; clothing, household products, etc. (via Hippyshopper) OMG!!! One more thing to be paranoid about. Weirdest Shoes Ever! 10 free [...]

Laura Zindel Ceramics. Fascinating. Dishes with pictures of various creepy crawlies and a few butterflies and birds. I’ve always been fascinated with pretty and unusual dishes and when I was a kid I dreamed of someday having a dozen or so complete sets – one for every meal of the week plus some special sets [...]

Do you know what the “recycling symbol” really means? In 1988, the Society of the Plastics Industry developed a resin identification code — a numbering system from 1 to 7 — categorizing different types of plastic. The code is centered in a triangle made of arrows chasing each other. This mark is commonly misidentified as [...]

Alexander Courage, composer of the original Star Trek theme died on May 15th. To be honest, I didn’t know whether or not he was still alive. I’ve never known much about him except that he wrote the music for Star Trek and I occasionally noticed his name in a few other credits. I had never [...]

Remember when space travel – real space travel – was exciting? Remember when the TV networks – all three of them – preempted regular programming to broadcast every rocket launch? Remember watching blurry black and white pictures of spacesuited figures bouncing around on the moon? Remember when there was nothing in the world that could [...]

A modern retro McDonalds. Still ugly and I bet their food isn’t any better either. Bridges – I like that first one. Very interesting. Snow Owl – Native American history and culture The Scientific Indian (India) – a Science Blog Nick Bostrom, director Future of Humanity Institute – transhumanism, ethics, philosophy, speculation Pick Up As [...]

Have you ever noticed how ridiculously long some stores’ receipts are? Yesterday we went to Lowes and bought four items. The receipt for those four items was twenty-four inches long! That’s not including a rebate form which was nearly as long. That is absolutely ridiculous. By comparison, a Wal-mart receipt with exactly fifty items on [...]

As with all things that pass before our eyes that we can’t live without the majority of the watches were, of course, not for sale. — here I suppose this makes more sense than, say, Rose McGowan having an M4 Carbine for a prosthetic leg, but not much more — there I want my fat [...]

I have never watched Masterpiece Theatre. I know… sad and strange, but true. There was always something else on at the same time that someone at my house wanted to watch and while I was occasionally sort of interested I just went with the flow. It’s not much fun to watch TV alone anyway. But [...]

Scientists say that a big behind might be a good thing, but… Researchers have known for some time that fat that collects in the abdomen — known as visceral fat — can raise a person’s risk of diabetes and heart disease, while people with pear-shaped bodies, with fat deposits in the buttocks and hips, are [...]

David Thompson has crayons and crayon links. Crayons are one of my favorite nostalgic childhood things. Sometimes I wish I could grab a coloring book and a big box of crayons and start coloring. Well, I guess I could but at my age I should probably avoid things that might give people the idea that [...]

Remember I was just talking about tattoos and how they might be a bad idea 40 years later? Well here is one you definitely don’t want to see on a 60-year-old body. I mean, seriously, think of the poor defenseless nursing home attendants. It’s not an actual tattoo; it’s a vintage nude photoshopped to illustrate [...]

Strange label. World’s weirdest gadgets. I like the transparent toaster. (Warning: a couple of the items are “for adults only”.) Downloadable paper models. Fantasy figures. Cthulhu, skeleton pirates, aliens, etc. (via Ectomo) Flying Vibators. What the hell!? These two videos are Russian so I have no idea what’s really going on but it looks like [...]

Thanks, Steph, for linking to the website of artist Marcio Melo. Cheerful, colorful paintings, including some murals at schools.

I’m not a fan of George Carlin but I like this quote: I love and treasure individuals as I meet them; I loathe and despise the groups they identify with and belong to. — George Carlin That is a very good point. A lot of perfectly nice people belong to groups that we can’t stand. [...]

Andrea has an entertaining review of the current season of Dr. Who. I guess I have to admit she’s right about most of that but I love the show anyway. Maybe it’s the British accents. I actually know nothing about British culture except for what I have learned from movies, TV and of course the [...]

You might remember a while back I mentioned that I was starting a “Secret Project”. Well, it’s finished and here it is: I made this quilt for my mother’s birthday. I had been thinking about making one for her for two or three years and I knew what colors I wanted to use but I [...]

Brain Rules – looks like it might be an interesting site. (via Bifurcated Rivets) Perpetual Kid – lots of really fun, interesting and weird things for sale. A nice collection of images – lightning photos, art, a couple of water droplets photos, etc. Museum of Black Superheros (via David Thompson) Flying Over the Columbia Hills [...]

This is a bit of a surprise. Tulsa is number five on Relocate-America’s Top 100 Places to Live. Here’s the complete list. Not that Tulsa is a bad place but I wouldn’t have expected it to rank that high.

I’m not a big fan of Maxine cartoons. I’ve mostly seen them on greeting cards, coffee mugs and things like that. To me she has always seemed like an unpleasant old sourpuss. But once in a while I see one that makes me think, “Yeah! That’s true.” (and then I think, “Oh no! Am I [...]

A list of things caused by global warming. It’s a list of links to articles about climate change. Unfortunately the creator of the page seems not to know about the br tag. Actually I think the idea is to overwhelm the reader with the number of alleged effects of global warming but my eyes get [...]