Notes from a Fiery Nest

Such dedication: the Swiss Mountain Cleaners.

Uptown Dark Lord Funk. (5-minute music video)

Ganked from zenten on G+, Panic! at the Disco covers "Bohemian Rhapsody"; I think they make it their own.

Ganked from goldsquare, An outstanding display of driving skill. The first little while is kind of ordinary, but then, a bit past the half-way mark, it gets incredible--the kind of thing one expects in CGI, not IRL.

Collateral damage from a recent social event...

Trolling Saruman

O Fortuna (Misheard Lyrics Version)

Total Eclipse of the Heart (Literal Video Version)

Michael Kimmel at Dartmouth (1h28m). I don't usually watch, let alone repost, all of long videos; this one is worth it. He addresses two things, and links them; I think each one is worth hearing about, even if I'm not sure I agree with his attempt to make them All One Thing. The two things are: a proposed new phase of human cultural development between adolescence and adulthood, based on cultural practice in the (North)Western world; and markers and rituals of masculinity and their relation to the changes in women's gender.

The first part gets into the question, "why are twentysomethings not acting like 'grown-ups'?" His answers are worth considering.

As to the second part, for those who were asking that famous question, "But what about the men?", this is a pretty good answer. He doesn't ignore women by any means, but there is a really solid treatment of masculinity here.

I'm not sure I buy his attempt to link these two things as closely as he does; I think his fieldwork among the sports teams, fraternities, and sororities of US colleges may have slanted his views a bit there. Still, I think it's a video well worth the considerable time investment.

[Note: there's about a 5-minute intro before Michael comes on.]

The Norwegian Royal Guard in a military marching band and drill team competition. Impressive stuff; we didn't get to do nearly as much interesting drill when I was in the Reserves!

8 1/2 min video with music, fullscreenable.

Video: an elegant card magic act, playing on Sting's "The shape of my heart". (4m 49s)

Ganked from siderea

Finnish Department of Culture--Horrified Fascination Division. Enter at own risk.

"Finland is Europe's Japan."

Ping-pong balls landing in cups, with variations. (Video in high-def!)

Robert Tiso: Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D minor, played on glass harp.

Beautiful, and impressive.

Very nice choreography in an unusual fantasy swordfight featuring Japanese actor Taichi Saotome (not to be confused with aikido shihan Mitsugi Saotome).

Maybe it's a bad idea for me to watch videos like this... some folks already find my driving a bit enthusiastic!

Speak with Conviction. (A poem, with animation.)

Between Bears is minimalist, artsy, pretty, moody, and oddly affecting. Link is to The Daily What, where I found it.

Forwarded a while ago from a cow-orker, just now making it to my LJ:

Canadian, Please!

Bouncy and silly... the making of video is cute too.

This is a very good explanation of how motivation can be done wrong, and how to do it right.

Less than 20 minutes, and worth it.

Ganked from theweaselking:


How the heck does one even begin to learn this kind of thing? It's not like "half-right" is an option...

She's talking about creative work, but it applies to other things as well. Just under 20 minutes of time well spent.


Over-internalizing responsibility is something I do far too readily, and right now was a damn good time for this to cross my path!

It may not answer quite as much as it purports to, but Dan Gilbert's talk on probability and value is something anyone wanting to make decisions that are at all rational should consider. (Video, about 22 minutes plus a few questions from the audience at the end for a total of half an hour.)

Three videos, less than 5 minutes each:

If you haven't heard, Bill O'Reilly flipped out on his Inside Edition show (clip and commentary by Steven Colbert is available here). Well, now there's a techno mix of O'Reilly's little episode!

Next up, Adolf Hitler has discovered just how "popular" he is on teh interwebz.

And finally, here's a very well-executed trip-hop track and video built out of Disney's Alice in Wonderland fragments.

Refreshed, after a long weekend: besides Monday being the Civic Holiday, I and most of my co-workers had Friday off (company perk) as well.

Aikido Thursday evening was a very enjoyable advanced class, during which we considered some of the ethical as well as the technical aspects of some variants of throws. Friday's weapons class was also fun, with jo practice (jo vs. jo and jo-nage, throws using a jo). The dojo's air conditioning was much appreciated by all, given the weather: hot and humid both days!

I ordered my new mixer from Steve's on Friday; it should get here next weekend! This is a Mackie, an upgrade from my Behringer Eurorack 1604, which I'm quite willing to part with at a very reasonable price. (It has a couple of minor issues: phantom power to microphones can't be turned off, and the "main mix to monitor" button is flaky.)

torrain joined us for stir-fry and chatting Friday evening; theweaselking was missed, so we'll have to flush him out of hiding next time. Saturday, I was visiting them for poker, which was also enjoyable, although I didn't win or place. (The 2-6 offsuit I was dealt in the first hand set the tone for the tournament.) torrain was suffering from an allergic reaction, although the cause was unclear; the only thing we could think of was some mysterious component of the stir-fry sauce. After poker, we watched The Protector, a very cheesy martial arts movie. Fortunately, the martial arts content was in fact quite good, because the plot flimsy excuse for fight scenes was more than a bit weak. It really could use three silhouettes in the bottom right corner.

S. and I went hiking, or at least walking and birdwatching, on Bate Island and along Voyageur Trail East on Sunday. Interesting sightings include Common Mergansers, Northern Flickers (pretty birds!), many Cedar Waxwings, an unidentified diving duck we at first mistook for a Mallard until it vanished below the water (Hey! that ain't no Mallard!), a Herring Gull (most of the gulls in Ottawa are Ring-Billed Gulls), and both a Red-Breasted and a White-Breasted Nuthatch (on the same tree, no less!). The ducks are tough to identify because the males are in eclipse: the colorful and distinctive breeding plumage is lost for a few weeks after breeding season, and so one is left trying to distinguish a lot of generally brown ducks. (This leaves some of them, such as Wood Ducks, flightless during the period!) Monday, we went walking along the Rideau river, and saw the usual suspects (including a few of Ottawa's Mute Swans), and a dozen or so of Barn Swallows catching bugs for dinner.

And finally, S. and I went to see Ratatouille Sunday evening, on the basis that any movie in the mid-90's on Rotten Tomatoes can't be too bad. We weren't disappointed: Pixar hasn't lost it all, even under MegaCorp Disney's influence. I'd rank it up there in quality with Finding Nemo. Animation is pretty impressive stuff these days, blurring the lines between reality and illusion. In the credits, they claim specifically that the animation is "real," in that there was no motion capture used for any of the characters or anything else, which is quite impressive given how natural everything looked. (How natural was that? Natural enough that it was completely transparent, and I never had a "people (or rats) don't move like that!" reaction.) Highly recommended!

Gaming Saturday was excellent, with a hefty turnout: 13 of us at peak, 3 tables going, and a very wide variety of games (Fluxx, Crokinole, Age of Empires III, Java, Finstere Flure (Fearsome Floors), Wits and Wagers, Ra, and Go) being played.

Saturday dinner was excellent as well, with S. and I being overly self-indulgent and going to Friday's, a magnificent steakhouse on Elgin Street. The thing about such places is that not only are the main courses wonderful, but everything is fantastic, and it makes for a deeply, richly enjoyable evening. Our only complaint, and a very mild complaint it is, is that the maitre d' is a tad on the unctuous side. (The waitstaff, however, is attentive, tactful and friendly.) I am looking forward to S. getting her G2 driver's license, since she doesn't generally drink alcohol anyway; as it was, we took the bus. Fortunately, given the location and the weather, this was no great hardship.

Then S. and I went walking and birding at Mer Bleue bog Sunday morning. We saw a baby beaver, and caught a glimpse of what we're pretty sure was a Scarlet Tanager near the Northern edge of its range, based on its song and what we could see of it as it flew off. (It had been hiding in the top of a fairly dense tree.) Also, I got a bit of a sunburn about the neck and forehead, but that's just a sign of summer for us fair-skinned types.

Sunday afternoon was the Bugs Bunny Film Festival at the Bytowne, and much fun was had watching the silly. My only complaint is that they had the volume up somewhat too far. I'd seen many of the episodes before, but not all of them by any means, and even those I had seen had often been edited down. Now I want to run a Toon game again!

And now, back to work... new music post coming soon! (Global Underground Afterhours, Grid, Bonobo, Rjd2, and a Digweed mix)