Friday Ephemera

New Order’s Blue Monday, performed in an old-school style. // Space race remnants. // Orbits is a game. // For those who had fun with Ultraflow, there’s now Ultraflow 2. But beware the hardcore mode. // A brief history of the umlaut. // Bike bell of note. // These bees make cannabis honey. // It happens, apparently. // Ocus is a puzzle. // It’s scenic, yes, but not everyone’s cup of tea. // A collection of coffee lids. (h/t, Things) // Acrylic and ink. // A series of bad decisions. // Rock salt firearms. // Music made with stones. // An archive of Oz magazine. // It’s a job with a high staff turnover. // “The victim pulled the knife out of his own neck, and stabbed his attacker.” // Thanks, Mythbusters. // It’s Marvel time. // And finally, ambitiously, all this little boy needs is a bit of a morale boost.

Comments

[Hal]

. . . performed in an old-school style

Singing glasses

[Hal]

. . . For whatever reason, the first of the following, followed by the next, brought to mind the one text to rule them all . . .

A brief history of the umlaut.

The men of Whee were stooped, squat, splay-toed, and stupid. Heavily ridged over the eyes and prone to rather poor posture, they were often mistaken for Neanderthals, a common confusion that the latter deeply resented. Slow to anger or pretty much anything else, they lived peacefully with their Boggie neighbours, who were themselves tickled pink to find somebody farther down the evolutionary scale.

Together, the two peoples now lived on the few farthings they made off the wetbacks and the dole, a common fruit shaped like your pancreas and about as appetizing.

These bees make cannabis honey.

But just as the long, red stamen descended to its unspeakable task, Spam thought he heard the snatch of a lilting song not far distant, and growing louder! It was a muddled, drowsy voice that sang words that were not words to Spam's ears:

"Toke-a-lid! Smoke-a-lid! Pop the mescalino!
Stash the hash! Gonna crash! Make mine methedrino!
Hop a hill! Pop a pill! For Old Tim Benzedrino!"

Though mad with fear, all strained to the rising melody sung by someone who sounded like he had terminal mumps:

"Snorting, sporting! Speeding through the arbor,
Pushing till the folk you burn toss you in the harbor!
Screeching like a dying loon, zooming like the thrush!
Follow me and very soon, your mind will turn to mush!
Higher than the nowhere birds grooving in the air,
We'll open up a sandal shop where everyone will share!
Flower folk are springing up, wearing bead and boot,
And if you down me you can stick a flower up your snoot!
To Love and Peace and Brotherhood we all can snort a toast,
And if the heat is on again, we'll all split to the Coast!"

Suddenly a brightly colored figure burst through the foliage, swathed in a long mantle of hair the consistency of muchchewed Turkish taffy. It was something like a man, but not much; it stood six feet tall, but could not have weighed more than thirty-five pounds, dirt included. Standing with his long arms dangling almost to the ground, the singer's body was covered with a pattern of startling hues, ranging from schizoid red to psychopathique azure. Around his pipestem neck hung a dozen strands of beaded charms and from the center, an amulet imprinted with the elf-rune _Kelvinator_. Through the oily snaggles of hair stared two huge eyeballs that bulged from their sockets, so bloodshot that they appeared more like two baseballs of very lean bacon.

"Ooooooooooh, wow!" said the creature, assaying the situation quickly. Then, half loping, half rolling to the foot of the murderous tree, he sat on his meatless haunches and peered at it with his colorless, saucerlike irises; he chanted an incantation that sounded to Frito like a hacking cough:

"Oh uncool bush! Unloose this passle
Of furry cats that you hassle!
Tho' by speed my brain's destroyed,
I'm not half this paranoid!
So cease this bummer, down the freak-out,
Let caps and joints cause brains to leak-out!
These cats are groovy here among us,
So leave 'em be, you uptight fungus!"

Thus speaking, the withered apparition raised his spidery hand in a two-fingered "V" sign and uttered an eldritch spell:

"Tim, Tim, Benzedrine!
Hash! Boo! Valvoline!
Clean! Clean! Clean for Gene!
First, second, neutral, park,
_Hie thee hence_, you leafy narc!"

The towering plant shivered and the coils fell from its victims like yesterday's macaroni, and they sprang free with joyful yelps. As they watched with fascination, the great green menace whimpered like a nursling and sucked its own pistils with ill temper. The boggies retrieved their garments, and Frito sighed with relief to find the Ring still firmly Bostiched to his pocket.

[Hal]

Oh, and given that next week will be the one year anniversary of The Announcement, consider a 2015 twosomething minute movie about a boy following his kite.

For more use of the same tools, see also The Infiltrator, from 2013, and The Elemental, from 2012.

No, I don't work for Epic Games. What I am extremely interested in is figuring out how to make better documentation so that way more developers and movie makers---like me--can have a far easier time playing with all the really neat toys . . . .

[WTP]

In defense of one of my favorite idioms, I always pictured the balloon or Zeppelin completely filled with lead. Though I always said "honed in on" instead of "homed in on", so you can't go by me.

[TimT]

"Trained" the bees to make honey from cannabis?

I doubt the training process would be much more than spraying the cannabis plant with something nice smelling.

[Joan]

And finally, ambitiously, all this little boy needs is a bit of a morale boost.

Got something in my eye. :-)

[svh]

"Underoos!"

[David]

“Underoos!”

It’s certainly an improvement on earlier efforts.

Whu-TISSHH!

[Nikw211]

Something ephemeral I just saw that really made me laugh - Chihuahua or muffin?

[David]

Chihuahua or muffin?

Heh.

[Anna]

'Socialism in action.'

h/t Tim Blair.

[Sporkatus]

Thanks, Mythbusters.
Thanks, ants. Thants

[Liz]

This.

https://twitter.com/AlexCKaufman/status/704711207786291208

[Farnsworth M Muldoon]

Hop a hill! Pop a pill! For Old Tim Benzedrino!"

Related, and also a song.

[R. Sherman]

Regarding coffee cup lids, I note the authors assert that variety is indicative of ". . . human ingenuity and capitalistic greed."

Greed? Really? Someone with an idea who's able to sell it and support a family as well as employees is now declared to be morally suspect.

[David]

Greed? Really? Someone with an idea who’s able to sell it and support a family as well as employees is now declared to be morally suspect.

Yes, it does rather jar. But it’s a default conceit in certain quarters. I’ve lost count of how many art-and–design-related items catch my eye as ephemera-worthy and are then soured by the obligatory leftist signalling.

[Hedgehog]

Car control in Dubai.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_hf6ke1-i3E

[james]

It’s a job with a high staff turnover

Oh Lord!

I have no head for heights.

My stomach does somersaults at youtube videos of engineers in safety harnesses scaling transmission masts and at Russian idiots hanging from buildings.

This however is in a class of its own.

[Southpaw]

It’s a job with a high staff turnover

Dear employment applicant Ahmed:

We are pleased to inform you the sledgehammer position in our building demolition company became available as of 3:27 PM yesterday afternoon. Please see our Human Resources manager at your first convenience.

[Jeff Wood]

That Times of Israel story: I picked it up somewhere else, and the report said that pro-"Palestinian" groups had protested that the chap who pulled the knife from his neck and killed his attacker with it, was thereby a "Zionist" oppressor.

[David]

protested that the chap who pulled the knife from his neck and killed his attacker with it, was thereby a “Zionist” oppressor.

It’s as if the great stupidities of the world shared an underlying pattern, a common psychological dynamic.

[wtp]

It’s as if the great stupidities of the world shared an underlying pattern, a common psychological dynamic.

Heh...you noticed that too. Thing is, I've been seeing it in places where I didn't think I was ever would (or was supposed to) see it. Which is its own psychological dynamic.

[wtp]

duh...edit fail..." I've been seeing it in places where I didn't think I ever would (or was supposed to) see it."...prolly unnecessary but was bugging me to look at...for some reason...i blame the leftover New Year's sauerkraut and pork that I had for lunch.

[Rafi]

It’s as if the great stupidities of the world shared an underlying pattern, a common psychological dynamic.

E.g...

http://pjmedia.com/instapundit/228970/

[abacab]

the Umlaut saga - shame they got a few things wrong. "Around sound"? Nah. "Convert-sound" more like.

And the double dots replacing the e is because the old-fashioned German handwritten "e" looked a bit like a short, backwards N, with two strong vertical strokes and a weak diagonal. So when written small over a letter it looked a bit like 2 dots.

I guess the producers didn't read Wikipedia.

[Henry]

"there isn't any lives left"

Really quite difficult with a hangover

[Joan]

It’s as if the great stupidities of the world shared an underlying pattern, a common psychological dynamic.

Milo Yiannopoulos 1, Sarah Silverman 0:

http://www.breitbart.com/tech/2016/03/12/5-times-students-got-it-wrong-sarah-silverman/

[David]

Milo Yiannopoulos 1, Sarah Silverman 0

I’m just shocked that Sarah Silverman isn’t the mental and moral colossus I was led to believe she is, largely by Sarah Silverman. And I suppose you have to wonder how it’s possible that so many of her equally pious peers and admirers, many of whom have wafted through the world’s most prestigious and expensive educational institutions, can apparently have no knowledge of twentieth century history.

[Jonathan]

Pure genius:

[mojo]

Someday, Sarah will get bored with rebelling against her parents.

[mojo]

Oh, btw, sez here that Barry, our Pointless President, is headed over to blighty to annoy somebody new. The man is indefatigable. Also annoyingly smarmy. Enjoy. Feel free to keep him a while.

[David]

And then there’s this, from the, like, totally non-sexist Laurie Penny. Because feminism is all about equality, right?

[JerryC]

Apparently we would all be better of with one People's Coffee Cup Lid for all times, places and situations. Presumably designed by government engineers in the Hot Drinks Division of the People's Grocery and Dry Goods Service. That's how it'll be in Bernie's socialist utopia - one deodorant and one coffee cup lid.

[Quint&Jessel, Sea of Azof, Bly, UK]

From the evidence of Laurie's photo, she is growing her resting Bitch face at quite a clip.

[Liz]

There is no need to pile onto individuals, particularly women.

Is he didn't have double standards she'd have no standards at all.

[Liz]

If she didn't have double standards she'd have no standards at all.

Damn autocorrect.

[R. Sherman]

That's how it'll be in Bernie's socialist utopia - one deodorant and one coffee cup lid. . .

. . . but no coffee cup and no coffee.

[Rafi]

It happens, apparently.

Is white van man being oppressed by the male gaze?

[pst314]

"That's how it'll be in Bernie's socialist utopia - one deodorant and one coffee cup lid."

Or maybe even "No coffee cups. Bring your own washable mug you earth-destroying capitalist pig."