Category Archives: Pals

New up on the wall

Art, Design, Pals, , , ,

 

Just got two new things framed. When Sam was little, her mom made her a cross stitch pillow with a scene of animals calmly gathered around a lion. We’ve put it in a deep shadowbox so it can go up on the wall for Secret Project Baby‘s room.
Little pillow shadow box

We also have a memento from Japan that we’ve never figured out how to properly display.  We loved the idea of Furoshiki – little cloth wrappings that you can reuse. We bought a really nice one and, after trying some other approaches, found a way to really show it off.20130428_124122_Livingston St

I also just got some new panoramas from friends for above the dining table and I’m excited to try them out!

A fire underground

Lit, Pals,

A fire is burning deep underground where you can’t put it out.

Pockets in earth whistle and moan with the fires exhalations. Everywhere your land whispers to you that change is happening where you can’t see. The earth is churning and bucking like there is a beast trapped deep beneath, struggling to escape and walk free over all you love.

Your house is unsettled.

Cracks spider out from the foundations of your living. The pictures fall. Everywhere, the scent of ash, the fear of the beast loosed.

What can you do but lie in your bed, afraid, wake, hang the pictures, patch the walls?

Could you dig down to it? Would you put it out or fall in, letting the flames run through you?

Lie in your bed as it all burns.

Book Review: Packing for Mars by Mary Roach

Books, Pals, Reviews, , , , ,

Mary Roach’s books are just like her TED talk. They’re smart, funny and charm you with a total affection for her subject matter.

I’ve read all her books and so far Packing for Mars is the best. She is writing about the insane goal of shipping a few bubbling meat bags through an irradiated vacuum for 500 days so that we can visit a lifeless planet.

She covers it all from a people perspective, looking at the glorious business of being a person. How do we handle the boredom, the food, the farting? She covers the serious problems with poop, pee, vomit and also sex. The book is worth reading for the chapter on Space Hygiene alone. It’s called “Houston We Have a Fungus”.

Near the end, a final quote from Ben Franklin, on someone who sees the Montgolfiers’ maiden balloon flight and calls it frivolous:

What use is a newborn baby?

Broken Road is an SEO optimized music video by Numbers and Letters

Hacks, Music, Pals, Video, , ,

I’m gonna brag a little and say I knew Katie Hasty when. She’s rolled with the Old Dirty Barristers and she’s good peeps. I had to share her latest video because it has stepped hard on all my buttons. My buttons might be a little cracked, so hard has she stepped.

This upbeat banger from Numbers and Letters is all about Kittens, Sex, Fail – the most popular search terms on the internet.

From their description:

This lyric video was designed to make use of the three of the most popular SEO-friendly terms: “kitten,” “sex” and “fail.” They are among the internet collective’s favorite things to search for. At times, they are interchangeable, full of meaning and without meaning. Congratulations, us.

This video was made possible through Creative Commons-licensed content and the contributions of Numbers And Letters fans. Cats cats cats

BTW – she does the right thing and cites her sources in the youtube page. GO KATIE! Buy the album when it comes out in APRIL.. WTF?

Your art on my wall!

Art, Hacks, Pals, Photos, ,

image

Dr. Mallin sent me this panorama from the top of Mount Grandeur in Utah. Now it’s up in the cloud gallery.

I’ve gotten some great submissions from friends – but many are too short! Please send me your highest resolution longest panoramas. Or don’t worry about it and send me whatevs. I’ll edit it to make it work if I can.

Here is what it looks like in the room. That’s Robin with River on his lap.
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