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approved links The Institute of Official Cheer
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01.16.03 In the next dynamic part of A Miracle of Science, our intrepid heroes will visit the Jovian moon of Io. I'm getting ready for it by repeatedly listening to the album Io by Micronaut, extraordinary practitioners of "the underground electronic sound of Chicago." Y'know, I didn't even know Chicago had underground electronic sound, much less underground electronic sound that's this good. Shows how in touch I am. 01.14.03 An elegant map of Pangaea. Pretty. Richard Cheese Croons the Hits! 01.13.03 Avalon is the newest flick by Mamoru Oshii, director of Ghost in the Shell and the Patlabor anime movies. Weirdly, it's live-action, and it was made in Poland. I have no idea what the plot is about except that since it concerns some sort of virtual reality game, it's probably something like this cartoon. Still, the trailer looks pretty amazing, so I guess I'll have to see this one. (Who says I don't appreciate foreign films? Oh, that's right, everybody.) 01.09.03 Yesterday was my birthday. Um, whee, I guess. Strong Bad gives you the skinny on Japanese cartoons. Another technique for detecting extrasolar planets. More information is available here. Welcome to Dick Cheney's America! 01.06.03 As part of my reawakened Dynasty Warriors 3 addiction I was forced, yes, forced to make some 1280x1024 desktop wallpaper for two of my favorite characters, Xiahou Dun and Zhen Ji. Xiahou Dun was the first character I ever played the game with, selected because -- even amongst the group of incredible badasses that are the cast of DW3 -- he sends the badass-ometer off the scale. And as for Zhen Ji... ahh, Zhen Ji... the grace! The elegance! The sultry voice! The way she says "You scoundrel! Learn your place!" followed by the musical whack of iron against skull... er... (cough) I blame society. Anyway, the quotes on those wallpapers come from yet another cool thing at Kongming's Archives -- this DW3 quotes FAQ. You're welcome. 01.03.03 Now that's one weird-looking date. Kongming's Archives is an excellent site devoted to the famous Chinese novel, Romance of the Three Kingdoms. To us ignorant Americans RotTK is probably best known as the inspiration for about two-thirds of all video games ever produced in Japan and Taiwan, including one of my personal favorites, Dynasty Warriors 3. The reason I'm bringing this up is that Kongming's Archives contain, among many, many other neat things, the music from Dynasty Warriors 3 (as well as several other RotTK-inspired games) in MP3 format. Enjoy. 01.01.03 And me still writing 1902 on my checks! But seriously, folks, the new year is full of promise and hope. Anything could happen! Who knows what 2003 will be remembered for, what we'll call it as we look back on it next December 31st? Although (to paraphrase the late Robert Benchley) I have a very good name all picked out for it if it turns out to be anything like 2002. Be that as it may, my New Year's resolution is as follows: less whining, more giant robots. Feel free to slap me at any point if I violate it. 12.27.02 Hope you all had a merry Decemberween! I've removed the cheesy (and CPU-sucking) Javascript snowflakes, but I think I'll stick with this non-oppressive snowy background for a little while. I'm heading out to visit friends over the New Year, but while I'm away here's a few links to tide you over: First, Tolkien fanatics out there may appreciate these brilliant pastiches of The Lord of the Rings. And second, The Commissar Vanishes is a fascinating and far too short online photoessay on the falsification of photographs under Stalinism to remove inconvenient people. Oh, and you should of course be reading A Miracle of Science. You're not? Jeez, what's wrong with you? |
